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"The strong sisters told the brothers that there were two important things to remember about the coming revolutions.  The first is that we will get our asses kicked. The second is that we will win." (Anonymous)

 

Stop Blaming Media for Sunil Tripathi's Death

25 April, 2013

Let's not turn this into yet another Tyler Clementi equation. Clementi wasn't killed by Dharun Ravi, and chances are whatever drove Tripathi to his death had less to do with the mis-identification and more to do with a host of issues unrelated to all that.

Cut Schools! Build Prisons!

First came the news, on March 21, that no less than 54 Chicago Public Schools (CPS) schools would be closed.  Rahm Emanuel, in a manner befitting his always imperious and uncaring Mayoralty, chose to be on vacation when the news flooded out to stunned Chicagoans.

Gay Marriage's Economic Underside

The Supreme Court takes up gay marriage this week.  Utterly incapable of understanding or relaying nuance, mainstream media continue with their myopic portrayal of all this as a battle between the goodies and the baddies.  Here, sweet, sad gays who just want to express their love are pitted against evil meanie Rightwing fundamentalists skewering gays and their children for breakfast.

This picture erases the complicated matter of what will happen if the gays win or lose.  We're screwed either way, no matter the outcome.  

Gay Marriage IS a Conservative Cause

Gay marriage will be legal in the United States.  This may not happen in the next six months or even a year, but is an inevitability, soon.

Undocumented vs. Illegal: A Distinction without a Difference

In representing only the good immigrants, undocumented activists are literally and metaphorically the dream activists of neoliberalism, emphasising individualised narratives about freedom over systemic critique.

Gay Marriage Hurts My Breasts

Gay marriage is supposed to help my breasts. The gay marriage movement, in its relentless search for rationales for what is inherently a conservative movement around “normalcy” and acceptance, often makes the case that healthcare is a primary reason to make it legal. In the process, it has created a climate where the most progressive/lefty people, gay and straight, fail to see that healthcare is an economic matter and something that should go to everyone, regardless of their marital status.

Fuck Love

By, in effect, pretending that violence is restricted to matters like rape and emotional abuse between partners of a sexual sort, or sexualised relations, as between organisers and those who work under them – the word “intimate” here certainly signifies only one kind of intimacy – [we leave] untouched and untheorised the great violence of power and silence that comes about in activist communities.

In other words, [we continue to pretend] that the only people who can fuck you up are the people you fuck.

About

 

Dr. Yasmin Nair is a Chicago-based writer, activist, academic, and commentator.  The bastard child of queer theory and deconstruction, Nair has numerous critical essays, book reviews, investigative journalism, op-eds, and photography to her credit.  Her work has appeared in publications like GLQ, The Progressive, make/shift, Time Out Chicago, The Bilerico Project, Windy City Times, Bitch, Maximum Rock’n’Roll, and No More Potlucks.  

Make Art! Change the World! Starve!: The Fallacy of Art as Social Justice – Part I

This article is the first in a series looking at systemic, structural problems in the arts community.  It explores the very real problems of undervaluing artists and their labor, privatization of the arts, and the structural problem of shifting social justice work from the state to artists. Part II is forthcoming.

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Dr. Radut