November 2010
21 posts
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If you read one thing this weekend, make it Maria Bustillos’s scathing but thought-provoking take on the politics of Harry Potter:
Rowling is a self-avowed liberal who gave a million pounds to the Labour Party in 2008, but her values are Tory through and through. In her books it is the hoary old white guys who run everything; women are popped in here and there for liberal flavor. (The...
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Are you in or are you out?
Some quick, somewhat disconnected, thoughts on introversion and extroversion.
1. Monkeytypist wrote yesterday that he was smiling, because “[s]ome extrovert somewhere has seen the ‘caring for your introvert’ piece [in The Atlantic] and written ‘caring for your extrovert’, missing the point rather spectacularly in true extrovert style.”
2. Certainly, if you...
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WatchFollowing from yesterday’s post, psychologist Jonathan Haidt on the moral roots of liberals and conservatives.
(via Amanda Woolley)
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Just a quick political generalisation, don't mind...
Conservatives believe that the world - how we behave, who and what we value - is the way it is for good reason.
Rich people are rich because they’re smarter/better/work harder. Women are just naturally less interested in high profile/powerful positions than men are. Marriage is between a man and a woman, etc etc.
Progressives believe that the world as it currently is, is not the best world...
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Weekend reads on gender, race, politics, popular culture, creativity, travel and more.
Postcards from a post-climate change London. You can also see these (and more) in person at the Museum of London. (Lost at E Minor)
Three success secrets that people don’t talk about enough. (The Skool of Life)
Marriage and parenting wisdom from guys I met in bars. (The Hairpin)
Women aren’t...
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So, I may have gotten a little bolshie on that...
In response to my post last week, Erika at pop/culture observes:
[I]t is “sexualization,” or at the very least “sexual objectification.” The issue here isn’t limited to girls learning that their main value lies in their appearance and their ability to perform femininity, it’s also girls learning that their main value lies in their appearance as a means to attract men and their performance of...
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Ask Rachel: What to wear at magazine work...
Kirsten writes: I’ve lined up work experience at a couple magazines shortly and got to thinking about how to make the most of my opportunity. Your article really helped me but I was also wondering if you had any ideas, suggestions or feedback on what to wear while on work experience. I’ve read elsewhere that office/reception type dressing is way too corporate for the funloving...
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Diamonds aren't forever: the marriage question
I am at that age where the people around me are starting to get married. Not at the rate of one every month or weekend, as religious friends and friends in their 30s have described their social calendars. For now it’s just a slightly speedier trickle of engagements; a ceremony a couple of times year.
I am also at a point in my relationship where the subject of marriage comes up with some...
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“[I]n public debate about this topic a number of quite distinct issues, with...”
– Alan McKee is a man of my own heart.
Alan McKee. ‘Everything is child abuse.’ Media International Australia, May 2010, p 131-140.
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If you read one thing this weekend, make it Zadie Smith’s ‘Generation Why?’ This one’s been picked apart a bit in recent days for its excessively cynical conclusions, but honestly? It made me want to make like Hunter S. Thompson and retype up the whole thing myself just so I could learn to write with such beauty and insight:
Generation Facebook’s obsession with this type...
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Anatomy of a Musings of an Inappropriate Woman...
According to the results (so far) of my annual survey, you are…
- 84.3 percent female. - Most likely aged either between 18 and 21, or 26 and 30. - 66.7 percent likely to live in Australia and 15.7 percent likely to live in the United States. - You came upon this blog through another one you read - mostly likely either Gala Darling or another Tumblr blog. - You’re an esoteric bunch,...
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Thoughts on meritocracy, aspiration and privilege
Some manifestations of privilege are obvious: how much money you have, how many influential people your parents know. Others are a little more subtle: access to books, computers, travel and art. But one of the forms of privilege I find most fascinating (and insidious) is a person’s sense of the possibilities available to them.
I have a somewhat complex relationship with the concept of...
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If you read one thing this weekend, make it Jennifer of Hoyden About Town’s essay on being fat in public:
Being fat in public is, so often, a political act, but just as often it’s an almost inescapable act. As a woman of colour who is often read as white, and a queer woman in a relationship with a man, these aspects of my identity are, in many cases (though not all, because so often it’s...
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Ask Rachel: Do you ever want to pack your bags and...
Anonymous asks: How are you going living in London? I remember you moved at a similar time as I have and I’m just having a day where I just want to go back home and have no idea what im doing here…
Until I flew to London four months ago, I didn’t have much sympathy for people who complained about the stresses of moving. This is possibly because the furthest I’d moved...
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How to be fabulous in three easy(ish) steps...
… is pretty much the theme of my story in this month’s Australian Cosmo.
It was inspired by a new(ish) friend of mine, who has a seemingly unsurpassed capacity to attract good things into her life. She’s always meeting interesting people (including actual and subcultural celebrities), being invited to cool parties (and European villas), and basically leading exactly the kind...
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That will teach me not to send out surveys I... →
Thanks to all those who messaged/commented/emailed me to let me know that question 10 on my reader survey wasn’t working properly. You are smarter than I am!
Now, if you haven’t already, go fill it out. You can win stuff. :)
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I'm three! Reader survey, prizes, and more
Last Saturday October 30 marked the three year anniversary of my first foray into the world of Tumblr. In that time I’ve written exactly 1988 blog posts (including this one), the most popular of which have been about how to get an entry-level job in the creative industries, slut shaming, the failure that was 2009, sex without condoms, sexual harrassment, magazine work experience, how to...
