has anyone written about the lannisters and compensation? like in a broad, overarching theme type of way? especially as it relates to bodies! (how shocking that i focus on body-power relationships oh wow sidonie it’s almost like those are your academic interests)
but anyways
A new app allows you to scan a product in the supermarket aisle and learn who exactly is behind that box of cereal. More impressively, you can join user-created campaigns to boycott groups of companies who may have lobbied against a cause you believe in.I couldn’t scream SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY fast enough at this. And it’s free! Due to all the traffic, the app is down right now - the developer says he’s getting more than 10 new users every second. Download it! Vote with your wallet!
I want this so badly
I re-blogged a picture of a little girl, dressed as Tiana, hugging the face actress who plays Tiana at one of the Disney Parks, and noted that everyone should have their princess. And a few people have now contacted me basically going “no, only straight white people can have princesses if you stick with the classics.”
Um.
No.
I am a folklorist, and it’s time for some Fun With Folklore.
First off, very few Princesses/fairy tale heroines who are going to become Princesses because that’s what you do are actually defined by specific physical attributes. You have Snow White, who yes, requires the “skin as white as snow” etc, but that’s to make her an alien beauty and justify the actions of her stepmother. She belongs to the Aarne-Thompson tale type 709, which is commonly referred to as “Snow White,” but which contains a hell of a lot more, including “Bella Venezia”, “Myrsina”, “Nourie Hadig” and “Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree.” All those links will take you to Wikipedia. Click them. Note that NOT ONE of those girls is defined by her appearance, beyond “incredibly beautiful.” “Nourie Hadig” is Armenian in origin; you can bet that girl was not white as snow. (Note that I do not actually care for the “Nourie Hadig” 709 variant, due to using a Roma girl as the main adversary, but that’s another story.) Any story you want to tell is going to have variants where the heroines are never described! You know why?
BECAUSE THE PEOPLE WHO WERE TELLING THESE STORIES UNDERSTOOD THAT IT WAS IMPORTANT FOR CHILDREN TO SEE THEMSELVES IN THE MIRROR OF THE TALE.
There are fairy tales about people with disabilities, ranging from the physical (missing limbs, missing eyes, missing tongues) to the emotional (girls who cannot smile, boys who cannot feel fear). There are fairy tales that end in same-sex marriage. There’s even an excellent fairy tale about gender identity, “The Princess Who Became A Prince,” in which our hero has always felt he was a boy, but tried to be a dutiful daughter, until a dragon stole a neighbor princess and he had to ride to rescue the girl in order to save the kingdom. One misaimed curse later, and wham, our new-minted prince is finally outwardly as he had been all along on the inside.
THIS IS JUST AS OLD AND TRUE AND SCHOLASTIC AS CINDERELLA AND THE OTHERS.
The “big fairy tales” of today are the ones that someone seized on as marketable. We have the power, as drivers of media, to say that we want more diversity. We want Princesses of every race, creed, and religion, and we have the folklore and fairy tales to make them real. We want our transgender Princess (although wow would the marketing be problematic). Saying “the classics” are 100% about straight white people reduces the past to a place where only straight whiteness existed, and where no other children ever needed stories. And that’s not what the past was.
Once upon a time has never stopped being right now.
(Source: tstarked)
These 2 Maps About Student Loans Explode One of the Biggest Myths About Student Loans
The media fixates on the overall size of student debt. But where you go to school, whether you graduate, and what kind of job you get later may matter much more.
Read more. [Images: FRBNY Consumer Credit Panel]
“Why, in contemporary YA novels that feature groups of kids as friends, the black girl or boy is always a sidekick, secondary character, or nonentity?”
The way my daughter and son see it, this is the kid with no character development, no backstory, no emotional growth, no family, and dialogue one-liners that don’t amount to much.
It’s a common cliché, and it’s very subtle. In our ever-increasing commitment to include diverse characters in novels, we’ve also, at the same time, increased a stereotype ― that black kids (when they’re among an “ensemble cast”) don’t have much going on and aren’t worthy of the spotlight.
In the old days they called this tokenism ― sticking a person of color into the mix for the sake of having a black face among the group. This has its disadvantages. Young readers want to know what’s in the hearts and souls that are behind those faces of color. But when we don’t give these characters the same depth as is allowed the other characters, we perpetuate the stereotype that black teens are lesser people.
Andrea Davis Pinkney talks about the “Sidekick Syndrome” on CBC Diversity and offers some suggestions on how to fix it. (via richincolor)
—Preferably one-story fandom ideas
We know.
(Source: lilkisara)
Thrift Shop 8bit (x)
Macklemoredude this sounds like really bad ass boss music holy shit??
wow
whoops my hand slipped
