Happy V-Day to all of you. In case you haven’t heard, the University of Cincinnati’s celebration of V-Day — which stands for victory, valentine and vagina — is set for Monday, March 1, 7 p.m. in ERC 427.
I've got my script, and I am delivering the monologue I was born to give. Are you ready?
V-Day is a global movement to stop violence against women and girls. The Vagina Monologues, penned by Eve Ensler, are performed around Valentine’s Day to raise money and awareness for issues like rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation and sexual slavery.
The monologues have been performed by all-star casts including the likes of Jane Fonda, Whoopi Goldberg and Susan Sarandon. There have even been all-transwomen casts.
Angel L. Brown, founder/Producer of Queer Black Cinema teamed of with promoter Ron to throw one of the biggest party of the year at Secret Lounge Friday, February 19 (9:30 PM). Angel decided to turn her birthday celebration into a hug fundrasier for the 3rd Annual Queer Black Cinema International Film Festival 2010. “I wanted to start early with raising funds for the festival. This year, I would like to help filmmakers who are exhibiting their work to be in attending which can be very difficult if they live out of state or out of the country. We are the only Black LGBT Film Festival in New York City. If everyone support, there shouldn’t be any reason why this festival can be one of the most successful well attended festivals out there. If we don’t support our own images, you really can’t expect anyone else to” states, Angel L. Brown.
Back in December Angel attended a birthday party at Secret Lounge and had a blast! She enjoyed the music, the atmosphere and the excellent hospitality the promoter and his crew shown. Although Secret Lounge had prominently males in attendance, there was a nice group of ladies there as well. “Everyone was dancing to the music and having a wonderful time. The club is open to all LGBT and LGBT friendly people and had a great time and would attend any of Ron’s parties” states Angel L. Brown. Angel was introduced to Promoter Ron by Recording Artist, Jesse O. Jesse O will be in attending singing his version of “Happy B-day” to Angel.
The QBC Fundraiser is happening Friday, February 19 at 525
Challenges: New Author Challenge 2010, We Didn’t Start the Fire 2010 (AIDS), POC Reading Challenge
I don’t have nothing to write today – maybe never. Hammer in my heart now, beating me, I feel like my blood a giant river swell up inside me and I’m drwoning. My head all dark inside. Feel like giant river I never cross in front me now. Ms Rain say, You not writing Precious. I say I drownin’ in river. She don’t look me like I’m crazy but say, If you just sit there the river gonna rise up drown you! Writing could be the boat carry you to the other side. One time in your journal you told me you had never really told your story. I think telling your story git you over that river Precious.
I still don’t move. She say, “Write.” I tell her, “I am tired. Fuck you!” I scream, “You don’t know nuffin’ what I been through!” I scream at Ms Rain. I never do that before. Class look shock. I feel embarrass, stupid; sit down, I’m made a fool of myself on top of everthing else. “Open your notebook Precious.” “I’m tired,” I says. She says, “I know you are but you can’t stop now Preciuos, you gotta push.” And I do.
-Push by Sapphire, pages 96-97
wow. I mean really, WOW.
Push by Sapphire is a book of truth. It is raw, heart-breaking, and hard. It is inspiring, hope-filled, naked and honest. It is not the kind of book that will appeal to everyone, not that happy beach book many want, it is stark and dark and real and beautiful. It could’ve been exploitative, could’ve been depressing and hopeless, could’ve so easily become an anti-white, anti-men rant, but Sapphire managed to weave the story together, as told by the main character, Precious Jones, into an emotional tale of how education can give hope for a chance at freedom and a better life.
I knew a bit about the story from the movie based on the book, Precious. I haven’t yet seen the movie (are you kidding? There’s no way the theater owner of our little 2-screener would’ve had THAT movie in HIS place! Heck, he wouldn’t bring in a Tyler Perry movie, and they’re funny with a little “let’s get real” on the side), so I have to way until it comes out on DVD next month (already in my Netflix queue), but I have seen the trailers and watched the interviews and heard the awards buzz about it. From the few scenes I’ve seen, and after reading the book, the movie should win every award it could qualify for, and if it doesn’t, I’ll be irate. I also knew about this book from seeing it being checked out… always out and never in… at the library, and from reading Kathy at Bermudaonion’s review back in December.
So when I wandered (drifted mindlessly, to be more accurate) to the book section at Walmart the day before yesterday and saw it on the shelf, it was in my cart before Maggie could say, “No more books, MOM!” Now, my policy for buying new books at full price is that it HAS to be a book I will read immediately. Not next month or next year, but this week or sooner. I was already several pages into Push before I left the store, and finished a little more than 24 hours after buying it. Push is the kind of book that, as soon as you put it down, you pick it back up and start reading again, forgetting why you’d put it down in the first place. The kind of book you forget to eat because it’s so engrossing. I could barely go to the bathroom, and would worry and wonder what was going on with Precious while I was gone from her. It will, without a doubt, be one of my top 10 books of 2010, and on my favorites list forever.
Okay, so enough gushing…. Let’s deal with the book itself.
One of the first things I got out of Push, was the realization of what it was, exactly, that I’d hated about The Blue Notebook by James A. Levine. Both Precious and Batuk narrate their respective stories through writing in a journal. Both books deal with the loss of innocence, sexual abuse, the sacrifice of the child by a parent, animosity between mother and daughter, and that education is the only hope and chance of escape. But where they differ greatly is in the voice of the narrator. Precious is pissed. She’s upset, emotional, and expresses her sense of injustice at the terrible hand life has dealt her. WHY? is her question over and over. And understandably so; you expect these feelings. Batuk, on the other hand, falls flat. She’s accepting of her situation, barely registers emotion, occassionally expresses that she misses her father (the same man who sold her) and waxes nostalgic for the past. Aarti of B O O K L U S T tweeted that she felt Batuk was a strong character, but I never saw any strength in her. I do, however, agree that the overall voice of The Blue Notebook was despair and hoplessness, as Batuk knew she could never escape the situation.
Another thing I can tell you, with personal authority, is that the feelings and experiences Precious expresses from the standpoint of being an incest survivor is very real and very true. There are things that Precious says about the sex with her father that are difficult for a child to wrap their own head around, let alone have the courage to say outloud, even in a journal. Things like the shame you feel at feeling physical pleasure during this situation that you know in every fiber of your being is WRONG. It’s one of the things that totally screws up the person’s ability to relate sexually for the rest of their life. Also, Precious’s reference to genitals, hers as well as others, reflects how deeply incest survivors view their own objectification as a sex object. “I am of no value nor worthy of love except through sex.” is the personal worth statement of many, no matter how long it’s been since the last occurance (it’s been over 10 years for me, and he’s now dead, and yet it still that thought pervades), and the longer the abuse went on, the more pervasive and rooted that feeling becomes.
Besides the sensitive subject of molestation and the emotional affectation of the book, there is also the racial side of things. This is where my brain spent more time, because it’s the only part I don’t share with Precious (well, that and I didn’t have children by my abuser). I would say, “I hope I don’t offend anyone,” but then would holding back in an attempt to be non-offensive honor my Flavor of the Week, Amy, or create dialogue? No, it would not. So let the offense commence!
Push by Sapphire – on Race and racism
This review may become my longest ever (except The Book Thief, and may surpass that and the companion post), but I don’t care. It deserves the length and the discussion. Let’s get real, as Dr. Phil says.
Precious has a poster on her wall of the famous leader of The Nation of Islam, and often refers to him as the only real man she knows. One of his sentiments that she echos more than once is, “problem is not crack but the cracker” (page 83). I will heartily admit there are far more white people who have put their feet on the back of the neck of blacks throughout history than have helped, but maybe I’m naive in hoping things are better now than before. I grew up in with a racist father who told offensive jokes and used the N word often, though he was not as bad as a lot of my friends parents. It’s the way things were then. It should NOT have been, and it was wrong, but it was what it was. I’ve done my best to free myself from all that biggotry and to unlearn the prejudice, but it’s still something I’m aware of. My hope is that my children will never think multiculturalism an oddity, but that it comes as natural to them as sunshine and breathing.
As the story progresses, Ms Rain, Precious’s teacher, shows her that not ALL Farrakhan’s ideas are right, like his anti-semitism and anti-homosexual beliefs, and Precious understands and sees her point. She still hangs on to him as an inspiration and hero, citing him in her poem at the end of the book “Get up off your knees, Farrakhan say”, which I think is maturity in anyone. As I’ve gotten older, read more, and learned more, there’s one thing I’ve come to understand about people. We want a quick and easy, singular answer. Life is anything but that, though, and no one person has the answers to everything, nor is he or she right all the time. You have to sift and take away what’s worthy and leave the rest. Most of the people you glean from aren’t good or bad, but a mixture of the two, and we must see their humanity and avoid the temptation to adulation or hate.
Other moments in the book that show the sense of distrust and dislike of whites are things like Precious’s feelings in the school counselor’s office, or the social worker’s office in the halfway house. Precious, as well as the others in her class, express distrust, fear, and blame the white people in charge of her case. This, I think, is the sentiment that sticks in my heart and throat as I try to wrap my head around it and put myself in her shoes. Everywhere Precious would turn, there is a white wall blocking her escape. No one stepped in to take her out of the situation after her first baby was born. Who stood up to help her learn to read? Where was the teacher when Precious was having su
The following e-mails are actual letters from my inbox. They are posted here verbatim, with no edits. My comments are in italics. If you would like to contact me, please write to stuffqueerpeopleneedtoknow@gmail.com.
Dear Jamie,
Close to Christmas, which commemorates the birth of Jesus, actor Chuck Norris has leashed out against Obama’s health reform. In a column published by World Net Daily entitled “What if Mother Mary had Obamacare?” Norris states: Mary, as a poor adolescent would have received help and assistance through Family Planning in order to stop her pregnancy. Therefore, Baby Jesus would not have been born and… “what then would have been the fate of the world ?” He also regrets Obama’s policy in favour of abortion when so many Americans , he says, are against abortion. In the USA the pro-life tendency has reached its highest peak in decades in 2009. Abortion is becoming increasingly unacceptable.
Isabel Planas
If Mary had the right to choose, I don’t know what she would have done. She probably would have kept the baby, as abortion procedures were extremely dangerous 2,000 years ago and involved ingesting mercury or other harmful substances.
But if Mary had universal health care, you had better believe she wouldn’t have given birth in a manger.
Dear Jamie,
What Research Shows , a study published by the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality based on over one hundred years’ experience derived from clinical studies and research , proves that it is possible for men and women to diminish their unwanted homosexual attraction and to develop their heretosexual potential without suffering any harm. This is a very convenient fact as the homosexuals’ experiences and risk factors related to medical pathology and of psychological origin or arising from relationships are much greater than for the population as a whole . In spite of AIDS, homos continue practicing unsafe sex ,being the group with the highest rate of sexually transmitted diseases. It is a fact that over one third homosexuals are drug addicts and 40% of teenager homos report suicide attempts. Also, the number of mental disorders suffered by homosexuals is higher than for heterosexuals: eating disorders andpersonality disorders such as paranoia, depression and anxiety. Also, homosexual relationships are especially violent. NARTH, according to 600 clinical reports concluded that the sexual reorientation treatment was successful in many cases for many individuals who experienced unwanted behaviour/homosexual attraction but who had a positive approach, as a result of therapy or religious assistance.
From an ethical point of view, psychologists and psychiatrists must provide psycho-educational and therapeutic assistance to those gays and lesbians wanting a change of direction in their sexual orientation.
Pili Montalban
Any pathologization of a social construction is very dangerous. The LGBTQQIA identities are defined and stigmatized by society at large. Because of this, queers think they are wrong because who they are is not accepted by society. If the LGBTQQIA identities were accepted, they wouldn’t want to be cured.
Homos aren’t the cause of the spread of AIDS; abstinence-only education and lacking access to contraception is the cause. And, actually, it is not a fact that one-third of homosexuals are drug addicts; however, it is a fact that one-third of teen suicides are committed by gay teens. This is because being a gay teen is an extremely hard life, as 9 out of 10 report being bullied.
And just so we’re clear, NARTH is a rogue band of psychiatrists and psychologists that treat homosexuality as a mental illness against the Diagnostic and Statical Manual of Mental Disorders, the official guide for mental health professionals, and the American Psychiatric Association.
Title: Push