Sarah Palin announces her resignation as Alaska governor. (Full transcript.)

Need a hand, Sarah? That cross won't nail you to it itself!

Things which are hot: Anne Hathaway in drag for her part as Viola in Twelfth Night, more examples to be found in the NYT slide show.

I bought new comics today for the first time in forever, and they were thankfully money well-spent. ( Thoughts on 'Tec 854, The Unwritten 1 & 2, and The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard. )

I'm gonna talk about Art.

(Bear with me, this starts out with some obviousness.)

For a long time, there was Art and then there was all that other crap. What the artists, who were often a part of and/or funded by the privileged classes, made was in the objectively unassailable category of Art. And this Art was especially unassailable by the lower, 'uneducated' classes.

Thus, Art is a construction from societies which used top-down power structures to establish hierarchies which reinforce the dominance of the (most often economically) privileged over the unempowered. As such, no one cared if the unprivileged did not like, were offended by, or were hurt by Art - it's wasn't About Them. It was about the subjects who were also its target audience.

This idea is generally seen as starting to change in English literature with Chaucer, who wrote about the lower classes and worked to subvert the concept of Art. By now, most people tend to think of Art as an outmoded concept. (Most importantly to fandom, the deconstruction [Whoo-whoo, here come the postmodern police!] of Art forms a large part of the foundation for establishing the legitimacy of derivative works--a legitimacy which is ultimately unnecessary but often sought after by fandom.)

So, now that we kicked Art in its metaphorical privilege genitals, what is the point of creating? Does there need to be one or several *legitimatized* reasons for creating?

Not really, but people keep trying to establish them anyway. Often in literature classes, students cite one of the reasons for reading/studying literature is how it exposes the reader to the Others who they might not commonly encounter in daily life. (A million existentialists twitch, as if called by a far-off dog whistle.)

What these students really mean is that literature makes you less of an asshole. By being exposed to the Other, it is assumed in the students' reasoning that, following said exposure, one will better understand the Other and learn to view the world through multiple perspectives. The community standard of imposing harmony through obeying hierarchies (the standard of Art) is replaced by the community standard of promoting harmony through mutual respect.

And personally, I like this reasoning. I agree with there being fewer assholes in the world.

But with the warnings wank, the exact opposite is happening. Fanfiction is reestablished as Art. As Art, fanfiction doesn't need to abide by community standards. It exists in a vacuum and can be an asshole if it wants to, and it doesn't care how the Other reacts to it.

Why hello, hierarchies of power, so very not glad that you decided to come and crash the party!

The object lesson? Don't be an asshole. (Unless you want to, which is fine if you're, say, okay with being generally viewed as someone who is a privilege-abusing asshole.)

So, in an effort to make us collectively forget about their long history of public embarrassments, the Church of Scientology has unleashed a brand-new media and commerical blitz. All of them are winners, but my favorite is "Search."

One idea and four hours later, I do believe the ad has been...improved.



(Yes, I do sound that odd in real life. I am a combination of multiple accents and childhood speech therapy.)

So, SFRA. It was my intention afterwards to make an extensive report post, but given that as soon as I got off work post-conference I slept a total of seventeen hours (with a five hour break in the middle), I shall end up passing. Possibly in part because I'm still bothered by the fact I slept that long--sleeping for more than eight hours at a time just makes me feel like I've lost productivity.

Let me just say, in bullet points:
- Apparently, being an SF author or scholar does not exclude you from needing to get your Liberal Tolerance Cookie.
- Just because someone is a person of color and teaches at an HBCU does not mean that their panel on Race in SF is a great time to ask, as a white HBCU prof, for advice on combating homophobia in your students. Way to derail the panel, white dude.
- Wow, I have so much to read now, and no time at all in which to consume it.
- The SF Lit community is made of nice people, but decidedly old-fashioned and insular. I was clearly one of the few people who had a very strong pan-fandom focus and influence.
- However, I liked it enough that I'd like to try and bring in some more pan-influenceness.
- I am permanently stuck thinking in activist-mode. This shows when I least expect it.
- I still worry too much.
- I feel very bad for the grad student who tried to discuss Buddhism and utopia with me. I was worn out terribly for most of the conference, so my coherency level on serious topics was abysmally low by the end after I presented.

( Cat has, apparently, learned the proper way to lure in unsuspecting owners )

So...who's written the post-episode blowjob fic?

For some reason, I have been buying all of my books from the Dollar Tree lately, as a large chunk of their stock caters to my interests. These books have also been rather good overall.

I sense this says questionable things about my taste.

-

Having been stuck around politicians all of yesterday (see large digression), I have determined the differences between local, state, and national politicians.

Large Digression: Working my way through listening to every. single. gubernatorial. candidate, followed by a fucking two hour city council meeting with a half-hour of lawyer maneuvering bullshit that moved her case nowhere yet she would not shut the fuck up. Not even Councilman 3’s unnatural Blazing Carrotman Tan* anytime soon could distract me anymore. When I tried to vent my frustrations in my notebook, I ended up with OHMYFUCKI*scribbescribblenolongercapableofwritingcoherently*.

( Deep, astute thoughts. )

At least the lady who thinks demonic forces have possessed the city council appeared to not be in attendance.

*You ought to see his tan on public access TV! In fact, you should watch his public access TV show! His audience might plateau at 10 people as long as none of his relatives croak! He can't stop talking with exclamation points! Whenever he's in his natural state of fake!pleased, all of his sentences are punctuated with happy exclamation points! Except when he's angry, where in all of his sentences are punctuated with incredulous exclamation points!

It's no secret I love Saint Oniisan. What's better than Buddha and Jesus living together as poor roommates in Tokyo?

Buddha and Jesus as secret toku-style superheroes fighting against the forces of evil.

Evil being supervillains trying to forcibly join social networks.

Fuck. Yes.

Tomatoes.

Jesus?

Watches Kamen Rider.

*bawls*

*bawls so fucking hard*

I am, it must be said, not a fan of American Idol. As a resident of a state which has produced at least winners, I have unfortunately had to endure an Idol mania which is far disproportionate to the show's actual importance.

Which is to say, people around me wouldn't shut the bloody hell up about it.

However, this saturation has ensured that I have at least a vague knowledge of the primary contestants in each year's competition--thus, I kept a loose eye on the rise of femme Adam Lambert, curious to see if he would surpass the manufactured homo-hype. Given how rarely this hype is recognized (much less acknowledged), imagine my surprise at finding ‘Idol’ Final Raises Extra Question in today's NYT.

I can't lie, it's nice to see someone making the same points I raised in The Groovy Thing To Do. The dodging of questions, the emphasis on coded appearances, and the assembly line manufacturing style of Motown equals everyone's 'saucy but sweet' gay best shopping buddy in easily packaged CD form.

But unlike Motown, American Idol is a mass-market machine and not a (originally) small minority-owned publisher who goals were both monetary and altruistic. I still can't decide if that's a good or bad thing.

This is what happens when I have free time in the summer - I make silly things. If everything works out evenly, I may be making a series of AMVs using various Parry Gripp songs. I suspect "Cat Flushing a Toilet" may prove a challenge.

Anime - Dennou Coil, focused on Densuke

I knew it! Sarah Palin was an internet troll all along!

New layout! It is all Zetman, a little-known seinen manga I really love as a guilty pleasure. Zetman is basically a) an adult toku and b) American comics as seen by a mangaka, up to and including the really, really awkward female characters and belief that sexual abuse is "gritty."

However, I mainly read Zetman because of Kouga, who is every tokusatsu fanboy ever - he spends his entire childhood wanting to be the costumed hero, except unlike regular fanboys, the show is itself produced by his family's company which, surprise!, endows him with Bruce Wayne-esque wealth. Thus, Kouga builds his own Alphasz fanboy cave filled with every piece of merchandise ever and pays researchers with the company to design him an Alphasz suit with which he can FIGHT FOR JUSTICE! There's a lovely scene at one point where Kouga sees the first prototype of the final Alphasz suit (seen on the left) and is extremely indignant. Alphasz in the TV show had a cape, so Kouga needs a cape too!

I've also made a wallpaper, based on my original rejected journal design. (And I still have a TheBee wallpaper I made in high school on my site, for some reason.)

----

In other news, W1ll $h3tt3rly tries to make himself look like less of an asshole. (A small section of) the Internet points and mocks.

EDIT: This is possibly so illogical I need to money-quote it just for posterity.

As for racial differences - well, it's hard to tell the colour of somone's skin under the tan/grime of living rough.

As for racial differences - well, it's hard to tell the colour of somone's skin under the tan/grime of living rough.

REALLY.

After much thought, I think I have found Ryuunosuke's inspiration for Tenkuu Shinken-Oh.

( Not exactly what you expected... )

Apparently, Ryuunosuke watches exploitation gore flicks in his free time.

It is to megthelegend I owe the great honor of inspiring this post on the deep and thorny issue of the "name smush."

( What is, really, in a name? )

Johnny's fans announce their cry into the newspaper wilderness!

Even the English-language Japan Times can't escape fandom.

Bonus humor, on a article about Netsuke: "Many reveal a strong sense of humor and sometimes a rather colored symbolism: Otafuku, the folk-goddess of mirth, clutching a giant radish or mushroom with evident delight, is a common example; as is a naked diving-girl being embraced by an amorous octopus."

Awww, tiny sculpture tentacle porn!

A Note: There will be two posts made based on thoughts which resulted from reading my reading Samuel "Chip" Delany's essay "Politics of Paraliterary Criticism" for my SFRA paper: one on the SFRA filter dealing with Engineering the Future and the current politics of Science Fiction and its production (i.e. Libertarianism), and another public post looking at the comics industry, its ongoing struggle with fitting and creating for itself a definition, and how all of this ties into the dislike, in some fannish corners, of the existing editorial teams.

This is the comics post.

( That Childish Pop Culture Trash! Or is it...Art? )