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(Warning: I'm not going to be around to monitor comments, so I'm screening everything until I have more time.)
So, I've been on LJ hiatus for a while, and came back today to find that there's yet another round of discussion of race and fandom going on. I've barely skimmed it, and am not planning on reading it in depth.
I'm fascinated to hear about other FOCs who grew up within a fannish tradition. My dad took me to see Star Wars, but he certainly wasn't a *f*an, nor even someone who was passionate about SF/F. I got my exposure to SF/F via (primarily Jewish) peers who may or may not have grown up within fandom. It took the 'net for me to really find any significant number of FOC to interact with, and for me to feel safe talking about Othering issues within the genre. LMB's talking about the invisibility of FOC has been taken to mean that it's only visibility to the white gaze that matters, but I'm not white, and it was feeling very, very low visibility to me, while I was searching.
I'm wondering if this is an age-based thing. Are the most vocal FOC younger than me (I'm going to be 39 in a few weeks), or is it just that they grew up in more tight-knit communities? (My background growing up in an "integrated" suburb mostly meant that my sense of Otherness was constantly reinforced, and that I internalized a sense of "white = standard, everyone else is nonstandard".
One of the glories of the 'net is that geographically separated people can form communities of interest in a way that was incredibly difficult before. Saying that isn't a question of erasure of the prior existence of those individuals who comprise a community now.
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Comments: Add Your Own.
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I realize it's Mother's Day, and it's utterly the last minute, but is anyone interested in getting together a Dim Sum brunch on Sunday? Ben, Michael and I are flying into SFO at 10:30AM, en route to Sacramento for the week. Please feel free to pass the word, I'm going to try to remember to e-mail or otherwise contact various BayAreans on my flist...
Best and fastest way to reach me is via cellphone. Seventy-six Oh, Eight-oh-three, fortyfive sixtytwo.
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Just an FYI that after the round of replies I'm posting today, I'm off-journal for the next two weeks to take care of offline life. Apologies in advance to anyone who feels I'm running away from something ongoing - I hope whatever it is keeps for a while, or I'm available by e-mail.
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, March 7th, 2009
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I've seen ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) medievalist's account of being harassed IRL by someone, presumably in connection with RaceFail09.
Whoever you are out there, STOP IT.
Not okay, what you did, any more than what happened to coffeeandink or others "on the other side" was okay.
It pisses me off double because it makes "my side" look bad.
Yuck.
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Comments: Read 17 or Add Your Own.
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This is written in response specifically to kynn's post here, and about RaceFail09 in general.
Please, stop with the characterization of Elizabeth Bear's friends all being on 'that' side, and PoC on the other. It's untrue. Please, please stop. I've been hurt by what's gone on here, too - from the side, while stepping in and out of the discussion (for various reasons including time, energy, personal drama, and a need to retreat). Oh, and I identify as a Person of Color, and as a Fan of Color, and a friend of Elizabeth Bear, and someone who was upset by the horrible behavior some people who claimed to be either defending Elizabeth Bear, or the rights of non-PoC authors to not be called racist, or somesuch.
This wasn't a showdown at the OK Corral, with two sides lined up. It especially wasn't the white hats vs. black hats that some people tried to make it. It wasn't sockpuppets and trolls on one side, and pros on the other, nor was it the forces of right-thinking vs. hate. Some of us had contact with many of the major players in this before all this got ugly - and yes, some of these people are quick to fall into some ugly patterns, but I know of few genuine hateful puppykickers in this batch. It did get polarized, and there was some justified anger about bad behavior, but there was a *lot* of attempt at mediation that had wildly varying levels of success.
Oh, and yes, matociquala fucked up in a number of different directions. I think painting her as malicious goes way, way too far. A little compassion on both sides, please. Some people did some really, really egregious wrong. Did Elizabeth Bear, really? Or did she get stuck in the morass that is race discussions in the U.S. today? *I* step in it on a regular basis, and the Ineffable knows that I've had a lot of practice at discussing race and fandom. Someone who doesn't do it on a regular basis? Oh, the potential for awful.
I managed to have a few productive discussions on the side. I saw a bunch of people get really, really hurt.
Now, a final thought.
I've been thinking about what it means to be a PoC-ally/anti-racist. About what it meant to be a Righteous Gentile.
It took a lot of courage to be a Righteous Gentile - it wasn't something to be undertaken lightly. Not because being a Righteous Gentile wasn't the right thing, the moral thing to do. But because to do it anything other than all-out was absolutely wrong, and unfair to those Jews depending on the Righteous Gentiles. Imagine, someone saying, "Oh, I absolutely want to shelter some Jews, and I will! But if I see them making matzo out of the blood of Christian babes, THEN can I denounce them?" Er...FAIL. Massive, massive fail. Or even if it's "Oh, it got too HARD to do that, and I have to think of *my* family..." Still a fail.
If you can't take the heat, it's best to work on not making things worse, rather than on trying to make things better and making them worse.
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Comments: Read 40 or Add Your Own.
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Friday, January 16th, 2009
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This is late notice, and I'm sorry to say that *I'm* not there to meet my Mipple-Stipple area friends, but Ben's been teaching there all week, and now that his obligation is completed, he's looking for good nosh in the area. He's got a car, so he's mobile.
(In fact, if anyone wants to meet up with him either today or tomorrow early, let me know and I'll get the ball rolling.)
Funky, ethnic and cheap is good. Regional is very good. What's the Don't Miss thing to do, foodwise?
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Comments: Read 4 or Add Your Own.
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Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008
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Sunday, November 30th, 2008
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I haven't gotten e-mail notification of comment replies for *WEEKS*, and had been unable to resolve the issue until today.
Looks like it might have been a problem on the yahoo.com end, so I've created a new account at ymail. (Yes, obviously I know this is just another yahoo account, but starting fresh means that I won't have the "unsolvable problem of comment notification disappearing".)
I'll be checking it fairly regularly; it's myusername at ymail.
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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Tuesday, November 4th, 2008
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Ben and Michael and I are in Boston (actually, Lexington/Burlington) again, and again by land (via air) instead of by sea.
If anyone's up for socializing tonight, or later in the week (we fly out on Friday afternoon). . .
I'm glad to have voted in Florida, where I cried as I cast my vote on Prop. 2, and carefully, oh so carefully marked off my Presidential pick. I heard a lot of pro-Obama talk as well as pro-marriage equality talk in St. Augustinwe. I hope it plays out in the voting booths.
I want to be part of a nation that's welcomed and respected in the world, again. I hope, I so hope today.
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Comments: Read 9 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, October 18th, 2008
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Last I heard, the fire hadn't been contained, but it's moved far enough away that my mother and the rest of the family are no longer on alert.
Thank you to everyone for their goodthoughts on this.
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Comments: Read 6 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, October 15th, 2008
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My mother's still doing okay - last I heard, my brother was claiming "it's pretty much over", but I don't know how accurate that is.
They did get a mandatory evacuation order, and responded in typical SoCal manner - they planned to stay so that they could be on ember watch, with the understanding that staying in this manner means no recourse to 911 or LAFD escort to leave.
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Comments: Read 1 or Add Your Own.
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Monday, October 13th, 2008
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My mother's house is directly in the path of the Sesnon fire, should winds change.
The house has had its roof wetted down, the cars are loaded up in anticipation of an evacuation order. My brothers and stepdad and mother are all on high alert tonight.
Nothing I can do from here except hope for the best. I remember the last time the fires were this close - my kid brother was then just weeks out of NICU. Wow.
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Comments: Read 24 or Add Your Own.
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We're about to descend on the L.A. area on Saturday, and I'm trying to get a feel for just how nice/skanky the Oak Park Motel in Monrovia, CA is.
Oak Park Motel
925 E Huntington Dr
Monrovia, CA 91016
(626) 358-1148
The other option is the Hilton Garden Inn at $75 more a night - I wouldn't mind saving the difference and spending it on, say, dinner with friends. . .
(Sorry about the radio silence. It's been hectic - Michael's almost 10 months old, climbing like a little monkey, and sticking everything in his mouth that he can manage. I'm still creaky, but managing it better. More updates later, I hope.)
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, January 5th, 2008
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Well, I went to the doctor shortly after my last message, and had rather a lot of blood drawn for tests - rheumatoid, thyroid, anemia... All negative. He suggested taking a prolonged course of ibuprofen, which I tried for 9 days or so, with absolutely no result - I've stopped. At this point, it's nothing that traditional Western medicine has an easy answer for.
So, onward to a chiropractor. It was entertaining. I think the adjustment did *some* good, although I'm still puzzled as to why he chose to do my neck in one direction and not the other (since confirmed as odd by the cranio-sacral massage therapist I went to). Aside from the bone-cracking, his major shtick was to tell me that I should stop taking my prenatal vitamins (because of the dread effects of RED DYE No.40), stop eating oatmeal and peanuts and garlic - because all of my troubles, according to him, were because of food allergies. Diagnosed by means of small quantities put in my mouth for me to chew up and then have him "test my muscle strength". Which consisted of him pushing back on my bent joints and assessing "the percentage of strength" I was able to exert. Call me overly cynical, but given that he felt a need to painfully massage my thighs upward and then tell me that that was a result of my ingesting nutritional poisons...
Which leaves me where I am now, going to a cranio-sacral/energy work focused massage therapist, who's just done some work to loosen my TMJ and neck muscles, and do some other alignment work. His theory is that I have jaw/neck/thoracic tension that's affecting my fingers and knees and sacrum. Sounds about right to me, and we'll see where that takes me. Meanwhile, I'm also trying to track down an acupuncturist to help with the tooth pain, which is probably adding to the TMJ effect (in addition to the reaction to stress, and the odd sleep posture from breastfeeding lying down at night, and possibly the bed I'm on...)
Some days, it's hard to type, and it's been uncomfortable to write with a pen; but it's good knowing that
it's not any auto-immune disorder that's easy to find.
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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Friday, December 7th, 2007
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About 5 weeks ago, I started waking up with aching elbows. I thought it was just the way I was sleeping, but at this point, I ache *all over*. My finger joints ache so much that I'm having trouble grasping a pen at times, and the pain in my knees makes it almost impossible to get up from a squat or kneeling if I've gotten down to do something for my son.
It feels like descriptions of arthritis.
Is this just a severe mineral deficiency? (I've been forgetting to take my prenatal vitamins, and under more than usual stress.) I've started taking my prenatals again in the last two weeks and also calcium supplements with magnesium and zinc, and it hasn't gotten better yet. Hot baths help a little, but not much.
Help!
(x-posted to ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) breastfeeding)
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Comments: Read 6 or Add Your Own.
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Sunday, October 28th, 2007
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| Time: | 4:44 pm. |
| Mood: |  contemplative. |
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I've been watching the anti-semitism in fandom discussion going on, and for once I haven't been jumping into the fray of yet another heated net.convo. Some people in the last round of discussion have made noises about how self-othering (failing to assimilate) is what "understandably" leads to discrimination - my emphatic rejection of that stance is well known.
I'm typing this out seated at the computer of a place that I never expected to end up, and that's in a lifetime of unexpected places. My own laptop is not connecting to the 'net, probably because of a hardware issue. This is unpleasant, but in the grand scheme of things, I'm mostly annoyed and working on finding a solution. (Offers of help, however, are welcome.)
Anyway.
I'm also typing this with my 9 1/2 week old son slung in my lap. He's happily zonked out asleep. . .and I'm thinking about a half-read article in the May issue of Parents magazine, about the blue-eyed blonde mother of a half-Japanese American daughter. About the othering that she and her daughter experience constantly. How it makes her think about what her Japanese American husband experiences.
Michael looks like his father as well, but to many people he looks like me so that our connection has yet to be questioned - I don't know yet what will happen as far as Ben's connection with Michael. (Most people have just been stunned by the size disparity so far.) In his short life, all Michael has heard about his appearance is "oh, how cute, how beautiful, how darling". His father is ethnically Jewish, but not religously, and barely culturally; Michael is not Jewish by Orthodox or Reform standards. Michael's Jewish heritage is something he'll have a choice about asserting - his eyes and his hair mark his East Asian heritage for him without a word.
I used to think that it mattered whether one's non-majority identity was overt or potentially covert. Now with Michael in my life with both...I find that my concern is simply for none of it to be an issue for him - a wish for him not to encounter prejudice of any sort. Last night, a young boy engaged in an innocent bout of the tired old "gibberish attempting to be 'Asian'" gabble. I pondered for just a moment and asked him "Why are you attempting to speak space alien? Are you trying to get abducted by space aliens?" (I'm probably lucky that that sailed over his head - looking at that phrasing, I can imagine a sensitive child (as this one is) being traumatised by the reference to abduction. Ah well, I think I'd better come up with a different response for the next time.) All too soon, it's likely to be Michael's turn to deal with the idiots both innocent and malicious. . .time for Mama to start working out that talk.
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Comments: Read 15 or Add Your Own.
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Wednesday, October 24th, 2007
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I've been putting out metaphorical fires on the homefront here, but meanwhile, in L.A.-ish, my mother's house is close but not yet directly affected by the fires. . .
Wishing all of my SoCal friends (and everyone else out there as well) easy breathing and safety from the flames.
As I'm out here with Michael, I remember the fire in Porter Ranch in December of 1988, when my kid brother Bryan was just a scant few weeks out of the NICU when we had to evacuate. This time, it really is my kid I'm caring for while wondering about fires "around the corner", not able to do much other than take the best care of the infant in my arms while I wait for news.
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Comments: Read 7 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, September 29th, 2007
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It has been quietly brought to my attention that my previous entry was offputting to some.
I'm short on emotional spoons now, but not so much so that I don't care about other people's feelings.
So.
If you'd like me to have your contact info...I'm doing another round of "send me a screened note". Let me know how *your* spoons are doing, and what you're up to taking in/hearing.
Not a lot of emotional or physical energy to share right now? S'okay, I'll catch up with you later.
Meanwhile...I'm in a needy space. I'm also in a space where I could use the distraction of other people's problems. I miss y'all. (Or at least I *think* I do. I have no idea who's reading this silently that I may not be missing at all. Anyone who's reading this for a voyeuristic thrill of sadism is heartily enjoined to fsck off, though.)
Trinker,
feeling frangible.
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Comments: Read 2 or Add Your Own.
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Hi.
I've been mostly absent for ages.
I don't know whether I'll be around more, or even less, in the coming days.
Michael's a healthy, happy baby. You can see pictures of him at http://okopnik.com
Me...I'm having a long hard think about what direction to head in.
If you haven't heard from me in a while, I've probably lost your contact information (when my phone went into the river, and when my palm pilot crashed, and my VAIO died, all in the same 6 months or so). I'd love to get back in touch.
I'm not feeling up to setting up a filter and figuring out what I do and don't want to be utterly public. I figure if you want to know, you'll find a way to reach me.
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Comments: Read 40 or Add Your Own.
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Saturday, August 25th, 2007
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Hi - happy news briefly - Michael Kaishu Okopnik was born safely at 8:40pm on 8/20/2007.
EDITED: found a place, plans slightly different.
Thanks.
Unfortunately for Kat (Trinker), there was a problem with the placenta, and she desperately needs a postpartum D&C - or equivalent thereof. The sooner the better. (No medical insurance, incidentally, so things get slightly complicated). The best so far is Planned Parenthoood NYC is offering one on the 28th.
Anyone out there with information on where to go for this in the NYC/NJ area is requested to respond to this post, and please spread the word so we have more people working on this. |
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Comments: Read 52 or Add Your Own.
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annoyed.
relieved.
hopeful.
stressed.