DE EX

I want to tell you that social network GirlZZZ Land only for girls - lesbians and bisexsuals
has been opened!!!.it's like a facebook or myspace , but only for lesbians and bisexsuals.
You can meet other girls there and you will have some futures like:

-Create personal profile
-Upload your images
-Upload favorited mp3's in your frofile
-Post your personal blogs
-Make personal bookmarks of videos from youtube
-Create communities
-Use private messages
-chat with other girls
-online games
-and much more!

At the moment a lot of users of the network are russian girls,but the network has english
version of the interface,and I hope it will become international soon and hope the
network will connect girls from different countries!
Welcome to GirlZZZ Land!
girlzzz.eu

Hello everyone!

I was requested by an anonymous member to cross-post one of my journal entries entitled "Japanophile" to this group. I would be happy to hear all comments as long as they aren't negative!! =]

My blog is here: http://city_dreamz.livejournal.com

And also, if you like this, you may also want to read my story, which I will update regularly:
http://g3ntl3-wizp3r.livejournal.c…

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I don't know if it's just me.....maybe I get bothered by little things too easily. Maybe I'm too sensitive or easily offended...I don't know, but a term/label that has really been bothering me lately are the terms "Japanophile" and "Asiaphile". For those who don't know, the terms apply to a person who isn't of asian decent but has a strong interest in asian/Japanese culture, almost to the point of obsession or fetishism. (if that's a word...lol) It's very similar to the Japanese word "otaku", which describes a person who is usually into Japanese anime/manga to the point of an unhealthy obsession. (like this dude>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsuto…azaki)

       I REALLY don't like these terms. It's just another useless, unneccesary label used to further degrade someone. Why do people think that because you have a strong interest in something that you MUST be obsessed with it?Are music artist obsessed with music? Are designers obsessed with clothes?

        I hate when peple say I'm obsessed with asians/Japan. I'm not obsessed; I'm not running out to stores trying to lighten my skin, fix my eyes and straighten my hair in an effort to look more asian. I haven't forgotten who I am. I don't collect a bunch of things that are Japanese or buy/like something just because it's Asian or Japanese. I like it because I just do, and it just so happens to be asian or Japanese. I could see if I was an adult spending all my rent money on manga and anime like the crazy dude (btw, I only really watch about 5 or 6 anime shows, and I haven't yet gotten around to reading manga) But I don't do these things. It doesn't take importance over my life. It's just a deep interest, an interest that I've had every since I was as young as 8 years old. I wouldn't feel complete without Japanese culture, but it is not my God, it's not what I worship and I'm NOT obsessed.

        The term(s) also seem to imply fetishes, like when the accused "Japanophiles" say "I like asian boys/girls." People always seem to think that, once again, because you're into a certain culture and you're attracted to that culture's men/women, that it's nothing more than a fetish. I remember a "friend" of mine once said to me "At least I don't like some random @$$ asian guy just because he's asian." I was like "WHAT IN NEW JERSEY?!?!?"  She was implying that it was a fetish type thing when it's not.....I like Asian guys because they are my first preference. It's not a fetish or a fantasy or anything else like that. It's not because I'm into Japanese and asian culture. It's a preference, NOT a fetish.

          I know when I was around this friend I had a habit of saying how cute and adorable so many of the asian guys were in class, but she just seemed to think that because I said they were cute and because I like asians that I liked them and wanted to date them...which was not the case. Why would I date anybody just because they're cute and asian? Isn't there more to a person? I might like asian guys, but I don't want to date every cute asian dude I see just because he's cute and asian. And I might like asian guys, but if I met an asian guy who was a total and complete jerk/nutcase, I'd dump him just like I'd do with anyone else. However, this "friend" seems to think that he'll get special privaleges and that I'd stay with him simply because he's asian. It's a shame that I have to even explain myself.

     Well I guess I've blabbered on and on long enough. I rarely have a rant as long and as solid as this, as you can probably tell, but it is definately something that I needed to get off my chest.

Gene Yang's rather impressive American Born Chinese has apparently gotten featured on MySpace, but with a certain failure to recognize the anger in the "Cousin Chin-Kee" stories that make up a third of the story.

Gene Yang responds. Worth a read.

cross-posted to de_ex and debunkingwhite.

Environmentalist Suzuki to quit spotlight for simple life

I don't know much about Suzuki, but he sounds like a pretty great guy. He's one of the people who championed environmentalist ideas back when they were much less popular. And for that I commend him.

But, I must say I wonder about his desire to "live the simple life" --I didn't get the impression he was doing it to save the planet, it sounded more like he was doing it for personal or spiritual reasons and I wouldn't want to criticize that.

But, why is that so many people feel that one must go out into the woods in order to be "in-touch" with nature? Nature encompasses all living things and their environments, including humans. Why is "the environment" only considered to be places with lots trees and not many people? The environment is the entire planet and the environments that demand our greatest care and respect are those densely populated places where people live-- too often, they are unbalanced places that fail to serve any purpose for life, human or otherwise, except to conduct humans from one place to another, often to "escape" the very kind of place that evolves as a result of trying to escape.

Part of me wonders if "the simple life" is just another kind of escapism. Living in some rural setting may do greater harm to the environment, and in any case, it is a luxury that we simply can't offer to all of the people in the world. We just don't have the resources.

And as a luxury, is it even that compelling? Wouldn't it be more spiritually satisfying to find the power of nature working in all environments?

To each his own, I suppose. But the day will come when we'll find these notions of "purifying nature" absurdly quaint.

(x-posted from debunkingwhite)

Here's a decently written article from the LA Times (online?) on the othering of Asian-Americans in the US. I think it's pretty good up until the last two sentences:

Treat me like you would the girl next door. Then maybe you'll realize that I'm not so different from her.

I think this sentence works to reposition the writer as an other after having spent the rest of the article debunking stereotypes. Here, instead of saying she is the "girl next door," despite having explained her national origin (US citizen, born in Chicago), she goes back to positioning what the reader is to assume is a blonde, white female as the prototypical version and in return, describes herself as "not so different from [it]." Although the title avoids this error, it seems to have been written by someone else -- an editor, perhaps -- as the article itself is written in the 1st person and the title and tagline in the 3rd.

Thoughts?

Chris

Okay. I've been in this slightly heated (but cordial and interesting) debate for the past few days over at peak_oil. The person I'm talking to seems to be a primitivist.

Primitivism is a philosophy of ecology that holds that the farming techniques of "civilization" are unsustainable, highly destructive a prone to spread through all human populations like a virus leading to dangerous population growth. This is the part of the idea I have little problem accepting. It's why I'm interested in Peak Oil theory in the first place.

What bothers me is the notion that there are POC regarded as "modern primitives" or people who live as hunter gatherers who are not, in some way, caught up in the "madness of civilization" and thus able to live sustainablly, or at least at such low levels of population that they do not have much impact on the environment. Moreover, the primitivist idea holds that these populations would not take on the tools of civilization even if they had access to those tools, that is, it is not the limitations of a given environment that constrain certain groups from, say, devoting the first 12 years of every humans life to a program of culture eduction and specialization... but, rather, this is a societal choice, to live "at-one-with-nature" or something like that. Lastly, primitivism suggests that the "primitives" have the right idea and we'd be better off living by their example.

Now the particular person I'm having this conversation with has claimed that he's not promoting the idea of "nobel savages" but, at the same time, something in this theory, which holds our salvation to be in a simpler life without the oppression of civilization, makes me uneasy. I think that the idea of the nobel savage is still at the root of this in some way and I'm wondering if some of you good people could take a peek and see if you agree or not.

I may be a bit partial to civilization, I will admit.

---
To make this more clear at the risk of oversimplification:

As far as primitivism is about "going back to" a simpler way life, doesn't it imply that many (mostly non-white) peoples:

1. have no civilization?
2. are magical and majestic?
3. are less sophisticated?

Now white people have found groups of people "hunting and gathering" and there is this tendency to assume that that is how those people have lived for all time. This idea has been slowly picked apart by more modern anthropologists. But, it lingers.

Moreover, when discovering such people, much of the complexity and depth of their societies is overlooked. The stickiest myth of them all if that there were not many Indians in north America and that they all "lived lightly on the land."

What's starting to come to light, is that people are (surprise) terribly similar all over the world, that civilization seems to develop independently whenever people can muster up the resources for it and it lasts as long as they can keep sight of environmental and social disasters.

Primitivism treats civilization like a like of "white-mans-cancer" and, even though it is an attack on the established ideas and order I think, to justify its ideas, you have to make some eurocentric assumptions about hosts of non-white peoples.

Please forgive any ignorance this post displays.. this is my first time posting here, and I wanted to bring up a situation that I believe to be somewhat unique (but again, perhaps this is a common behavior among different cultures).

I am part Romani (also called 'Gypsies') on my mother's side and Native American/Nordic from my father's side. In attempting to research my Romani heritage, in addition to reading books and websites, I joined some groups on Yahoo, LiveJournal and MySpace, and as such I was able to get into contact with various Romani people. These people, it seems, could be divided by the way they reacted to my inquiries, into two different groups.. there were many like me, who had partial Romani heritage, looking for information as they were not raised in a 'traditional' Romani household, some of which weren't even told they were Romani until much later in life, due to their parents having come to this country to escape persecution (in places like the Czech Republic, etc.,) who were afraid to admit to their 'Gypsy blood'. These people were very willing to share and talk with me, and had told me that they had found some Romani people 'hard to talk to'. This brings me to my second group..

Upon introducing myself to the second group, I was met with hostility and disbelief. Apparently, I look 'too white' to be Romani.. I was called everything from 'gadje' (Romani word for anyone not Romani, aka 'outsiders'), to 'wanna-be', to 'hippie', the list goes on.. I realize that our culture attracts a certain group of people because we are seen as 'mystical' 'magical' & 'free-spirited', none of whom are aware that you can't 'join' us and become a Gypsy, there's no sign-up sheet, you have to be born with Romani blood. Having been asked on many occasions what my heritage is, and having told people I'm part Romani, people assume I'm Italian or Romanian, and it is then that I have to use 'the "G" word' so that people will understand that, yes, we're real, and no, we're not like Esmerelda in that cute Disney movie..

Having said that, I have only ever run into one individual that pushed the boundary of being offensive (though I'm sure there are many out there I have not had the 'pleasure' of meeting,) and I haven't encountered much of an issue with 'wanna-bes', and my opinion on that is that people who do things like that are simply not educated. The bulk of them have no idea that Gypsies are an ethnic group, not a fairytale character. Or, they see it as a descriptive term (as it is often used in America) for someone who is a non-conformist or lives a nomadic lifestyle. Once they realize they're treading on a race, and one that's nowhere near as 'magical' as they were led to believe, they generally back off.

The point I am trying to make with all this rambling is, I think some Romanies (many of whom are no more 'Gypsy' than I am, by blood percentage, and I am half) take things a bit too far, to the point of exoticizing their own culture (ie., 'you're not Gypsy enough, Black enough, Mexican enough, Italian enough,' etc.) Has anyone experienced this in their own culture? I have seen some Romani people who just can't let things go, and every sentence they type or every subject seems to turn into how (they feel) 'everybody wants to be a Gypsy', etc.. maybe I am fortunate to live in a place where I am not exposed to people who want to 'join us', but I just have a hard time believing it is a problem on the level they make it out to be. It seems, to me, more like they are fulfilling some need within themselves to feel 'special' or 'different' than everyone else.

I suspect this happens outside of the Romani culture as well, as I've heard people say things like 'you're not Black enough', etc., when they feel someone doesn't embrace the portions of the 'Black' culture that people feel they should.. this is a bit hypocritical, likewise, because that's almost like saying that anyone who *does* embrace the culture can then become a race that they, genetically, aren't.

I hope I'm making sense.. thoughts?

many of you know about artist damali ayo's work or may have seen it brought up in communities like this. she is now on myspace with audio tracks from the cd "what did she just say?," performance and interview videos, upcoming event notices, and more!
add her!

damali "create[s] performative and conceptual art that engages contemporary social issues through the media of visual, virtual, written, performance and audio art."

her work makes you think, she reframes reality as we know it, it's creative, it will make you laugh, and it'll make you go hmmm, like that song.

damali is the creator of rent-a-negro.com and author of the follow up book, "how to rent a negro."

ADD HER @ http://www.myspace.com/damaliayocds and pass the word on.

- heather

We've had a lot of amazing things happen for us at Heroine Films this month. A lot of it do to support from this community and others. We've gathered support from a lot of different places but honestly, Livejournal has shown us the most amazing people.

So as for what's up: We have finally posted the interview that we did on the NC television show Second Cinema.  You can watch it in at www.heroinefilms.net/scinterview.h…

There is an article coming out about us in this months upcoming issue of CURVE Magazine. I believe it comes out on the 15th if you'd like to check it out. Also, MTV's new LGBTQ channel LOGO has put together a package for us for advertising purposes (we'll be showing our trailer to the over 13 million homes LOGO already goes to) and they are interested in buying the finished film. As I said in the last update, we also got a large portion of our funding from the production company AMVF. 

Thank you so much to all of those who have supported us. It is all your continued letters, emails, comments, and donations that has made this possible. There is no way we can express how much it means to us.

                                                    xoxox, the gals at heroine films

www.heroinefilms.net

Because we have gotten support from this community in the past I thought I would share our most recent news...

 

We have gotten a LARGE portion of our funding!!...more details (and how YOU can help) at www.heroinefilms.net