December 14, 2010

I work with the Richmond Museum a couple times every year producing radio documentaries (this one was a rush job; editing is a little shoddy ><). They thanked me tonight at the opening reception of their newest exhibit in (almost) the same paragraph as the politicians and the businessmen. I asked my family to come along because I didn't want to stand stupidly alone while they announced my name to a roomful of strangers, but at the event, both my parents were visibly annoyed (Dad got bored and left) and Trumon later revealed to me that mom complained that I was "so girly" (ie. needy) for wanting my parents to go places with me. 

I'm still treated like a useless dependent who isn't expected to achieve very much, and I still struggle sometimes with the mentality that I'm somehow indebted to everyone. I have this idea that I need to give back tenfold because I'm such a bother, I'm always in the way, I don't know anything really, I'm sorry, I'm nothing...

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2010 was an incredible year. I composed and performed new songs, got As in all my courses, found my dream job at CJSF 90.1FM, became a feminist, interviewed prominent activists on-air, quit classical piano, improved my French, etc. I showed my resume to my co-op coordinator last week and all she could say was wow. 

After I got published in The Peak (8000 circulation!), it occurred to me that not only am I good at what I do, but I have a powerful voice that people are willing to listen to. It's taken me this long to realize: I'm incredible, I'm awesome. And the world is taking me in with open arms. 

I thought maybe things would be different now that I've been publicly marked as a professional, but my parents still have no idea what I'm capable of, or even that I'm capable at all. And as I start to make a name for myself in this big Vancouver city, as I start to build a life away from my parents, I know I have to learn not to care. 

I promised at the beginning of the year to post my new songs but I haven't yet had time! Here's a sample for now

"Megaphone is a magazine sold on the streets of Vancouver by homeless and low-income vendors. Vendors buy the paper for 75 cents and sell the magazine to customers by donation. All money from the transaction goes into the pocket of the vendor."

Most of the writing in Megaphone are by Downtown Easide residents (DTES is Canada's poorest postal code). I bought a copy from Patrick Doyle (image) a couple weeks ago and I think the most stunning thing for me was the realization that homeless people could write beautiful poetry and intelligent articles. 

I'm pretty much an "out" activist by now (thanks social media). I've been called self-righteous and I feel like a stickler a lot of the time around my depoliticized friends, but I don't pretend that I'm not still a tool of patriarchy, of racism, sexism, ableism, classism, capitalism. I can't help that I reflect the values of the society in which I was born, but I'm learning. 

I think it's fitting that every day my bus to SFU goes from West Vancouver (the rich part of town) all the way through DTES and then back into another rich area (my school). I think it's fitting that I study corporate media systems and a Megaphone vendor is at my bus stop every morning.

Sometimes I entertain the thought that some universal power is telling me exactly why I'm here. And it makes me feel brave. 

O LORD you are my refuge and shield. Protect my loved ones and I in this time of need. The sanctity and the security of our home has been shattered. LORD you know who the vile culprit of the tonight's break-in is. BRING HIM TO YOUR JUSTICE, for you alone are the righteous and just judge and bring back the laptop he stole! 
Amen.

(via Pianoman on facebook)

...somehow I don't think that's what Christianity is for. 

Speaking as a socialist, something that bothers about Christianity is that it separates everyone into good and bad, and a person's behaviour is always an individualized choice. Which it is to some extent, but this way of thinking doesn't take into account the poverty that is created by survival-of-the-fittest capitalism and that maybe people can't help it if they're born into a world of drugs and gangs and violence. To what extent can a person freely choose to obey the ten commandments when his survival depends on him not doing so? 

I am not excusing the thief of course, but we should not so easily damn and project evil onto others, especially if we had a hand in creating the circumstances that caused him to sin in the first place. 

(I think the point I was trying to make was that porn is something an individual chooses to do in the privacy of their homes, but it's also a cultural product and a cultural reoccurance, and therefore it reflects society as a whole. The existence of porn, underground or otherwise, affects everyone.)

RT @jennpozner: "If you don't like it, don't watch" is one of the most fundamentally ignorant misunderstandings of media, whose messages have impact regardless.

I saw a close up of a monarch butterfly today in a documentary and suddenly I felt like crying. I used to see them here all the time. Now, no more. Do we even have time to notice? to mourn, to remember? 

(Whole thread isn't posted, but feel free to stalk my fb if interested)

I was really shaken up by my argument with [bebe]. Friends are lost to mistakes and misunderstandings, never to head-on collisions. What made it worse was knowing that bebe isn't alone in his way of thinking.

I can understand why someone'd be angry in response to Chinese dissident torture, farm destruction, McDonalds advertisements, etc. But why would anyone ever tell me not to ask questions, not to envision a different world? Why are people so convinced that everything is REALLY FUCKING OKAY and that I should sit back and not worry because that's just the way things are done?

Has corporate obedience deprived them of all human curiosity, all natural desire to know how and why things work beyond what the eye can see? I'm not saying that google is an evil corporation, or even that all companies are necessarily. But who in their right minds believe that businesses provide services out of altruism? There must be a place for checks and balances, for criticism of the status quo. But censorship exists, and it doesn't even come from the elites. 

Skepticism produces innovation and learning; it's what keeps us on our toes, away from vulnerability and deceit. But dare to criticize and to question the norm, and society becomes lightening quick in singling out and marginalizing deviant behaviour - she's "angry", she's "going all activist". 

Emotions are irrevelent. What you feel is wrong. You'll never have a voice if you don't become just like us. 

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Dec 6, 1989. A lone gunman walked into Montreal's Polytechnique school of Engineering and killed 14 female engineering students. "I want the women!" he cried. "I hate feminists!" 

I'm reading The Montreal Massacre, a book compilation of newpaper editorials and articles written by Quebec feminists in the days and months after the event. The violence of the writing is born out of pain and anguish, so much that I feel sick and cannot read for very long at a time. It hurts to read about the hurting; my body is physically rejecting the vehemence of the literature. I don't understand how the activist left can be so constantly immersed in violence and fear (which they fight with, get this, optimism) while the complacent conservatives live simultaneously in the stability and ease of the establishment.

Last Wednesday I became delusional on the transit route to school. My head hurt from a lack of sleep; my thoughts were still reeling from the book. Everything became black with violence. Every time I saw a Tim Hortons disposable cup I'd see landfills. Cigarette butts, charred lungs. McDonalds, slaughterhouses. A girl sits across the aisle from me and I wonder if she's ever scared of walking alone at night.

At other times, everything looked perfectly normal. I'd flash in and out of the two worlds like Neo and I didn't know which reality was real. I'd open my eyes and look around, and there'd be no violence at all. There was only the ordinary cramming of transit bodies and the indifference of iPod bus listening. I have lunch in my bag and a stable, middle-class family. Everything is ok; what am I "going all activist" for? Are the rightists blind and stupid, or is the error mine? Have I been duped by, as Big Media likes to call them, "special interest groups"? Why can't I just smile and not worry and enjoy a can of Coke? I wouldn't have had to argue with bebe. I became an activist to challenge capitalism and patriarchy - not my own friends. Because I don't want to fight. I don't want to be angry. 

I'm so weaksauce, I know. I know women who've been activists for as long as I've been alive, but I shrink at the first signs of danger and battle. People have survived actual fucking wars and have come out stronger than I have - I've really only dipped my toes in what so far's only been a personal, ideological renaissance. But I'm scared and it hurts and everything's violent. I want to go home.

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I was in the office of Kathi Cross - the professor who let me do the project that got me started in all of this. I asked her about double standards, about feminist marginalization in the news. I asked about anger, and why I don't see any of it and she said of course we're angry. But sooner or later you have to settle down and do the work. 

I knew she spoke the truth and was ashamed. It's not that anger itself is wrong - it's one of our only defence against paralyzing complacency. But I am wrong to revel in it under the guise of "blogging", of "conducting radio interviews", and of "educating myself".

I asked questions but I didn't even care anymore about what Kathi was saying. I already agreed with all of it. I am looking for ways to a more progressive future, yes, but in its absence I feed my anger like an addiction. I let it spin out of control and I know I'm too disabled to be a useful advocate. Some subconscious part of me hopes that my visible agitation will cause some angel to have pity, to hold me and tell me that everything really, finally will be okay - that Polytechnique gunmen will never exist again, that people won't stigmatize and hate feminists, that tigers won't become extinct and that there are places where neighbours know each other by name. I don't want to fight for anything. I want to be safe and I want to be held.

I don't want to be a feminist - none of us do, but we owe it to the fallen. I remember the Montreal Massacre.

lololol I ruined all the photos. Every year my bday turns out to be a way for my friends to embarrass me on facebook >.<" gaahhr ok its not their fault I fail at camwhore, but still! omg hate fb hate hate *dies* D: 

I spent a good part of last week miserable over how I hate the materialism of Robson St (Vancouver's shopping district) and how even on my birthday I have to give up my activist ideals and do certain things in order to fit in with my friends, but in the end Alex (v. Roadlesstaken) was right. Of course I had fun. It doesn't matter what you do when it's with the people you love.

Because it's fun to get presents and to buy beautiful things. The food was really gross and fatty (someone put a cheese bomb on my pizza) and not at all local or organic, but it's fun not to worry about health or ethics when I go to a restaurant. It's fun to eat out and to be pampered by service people, even to ooh and ahh over the extension of mascara eyes. Why wouldn't I love the materialistic world? The comfort and luxury makes up the appeal. 

And every time I see Starr he comes to pick me up in a pretty car and I think about how nice it'd be to have a big suburb house with a 2-vehicle garage, business parties where we get to dress up and show off our spouses, a backyard patio for the summer and kids to share it with. I don't even want kids (as if 7 billion people aren't enough to collapse the planet), but it's part of what we're supposed to want. We were raised to chase the American Dream. It's not like activists don't desire the same comfort and glamour; we just know it's too late. We missed out on those golden years of unhindered consumption and it's time to clean up the mess. 

Mint told me yesterday that she plans to go into government work doing environmental policy. I remember the time she and I were talking heatedly about environmental issues; her bf next to her was obviously unconcerned, but he looked at Mint with an expression that said, "aww she's so cute when she's mad about the environment". It was condescending and it pained me that he didn't care about the things that make her heart beat.

I don't know her bf very well so I can't actually judge, but I know I'd rather stay single than to be with someone who think I'm a crazy hippie, bra-burning communist. I don't think even Starr would appreciate having an activist gf. Why would he attach himself to someone who picks a losing battle? It's easier to drive cars, to eat meat, to wear what everyone else is wearing. I've made my choices and I must leave him to his. 

The only reason why you can hear my voice right now is because I'm using this blogging platform. But normally you wouldn't. When Trumon and I are talking while sharing halves of the same chair for example, his voice is so deep that it resonates with the chair and cause it to vibrate. He isn't even speaking particularly loud, but he doesn't have to.

My tinny voice, of course, cannot do this. Similarly, when I'm on air with Bomberman at the radio station and we're talking with our mics on at the same level, his voice will be many times louder than mine. My mic level has to be set higher than his if I am to be heard. 

Women's voices are biologically quiet, but socialization causes them to be even quieter. According to the Global Media Monitoring Project, women are represented in the TV and newspaper news only 24% of the time, up 2% from 5 years ago, which means it will take 40 years to reach parity. There are many other instances where women are socialized to be seen and not heard, and as a result, we learn to neglect the power of our voices. 

I am telling this story because HuckDuck, Kenneth, Kyla and I were stuck in HuckDuck's car in a parking lot because of the snow, and I got bored and pulled out my magazine. They were bored too so they asked what I was reading. I showed them the cover and told them it was a feminist magazine.

Huckduck and Kenneth immediately squinted their eyes and looked sideways at me. "Uh...what kind of feminist?"

I squinted right back. "What do you mean what kind of feminist? It's the feminist kind of feminist."

"Yeah, but it is the y'know, angry, man-hating and well...lesbian kind of feminism? That's usually what it is."

My immediately response was of course, anger. I then faced the choice of either deflecting their comment or defending myself against it, but I rarely choose to be angry in public because I don't make any sense when I am.

At the very least, what I wanted to say was "The way you're calling feminists 'angry', 'man-hating' and 'lesbian' makes it immediately obvious that that's an inaccurate stereotype." But instead I managed a vague muttering about sensationalist media representations, and they shrugged and withdrew. 

There is a reason why I am a closet feminist, because the moment I come out I will be thought of as angry, misandrist and lesbian. My xanga subscribers see me angry all the time. This place is a designated channel for my anger. HuckDuck has been reading me since I started writing and it's never been a problem. But once voices like mine are stereotyped and labelled as "environmentalists", "animal rights advocates" and "feminists", they are Other-ized and alienated. Those who are passionate about the issues they care about will be deemed as angry and therefore dangerous, and their voices are subsequently shunned and ignored. 

Those who aren't angry obviously just don't give a fuck. Their shunning of anger in the public sphere normalizes silence, complacency and inaction. I don't think world peace is just an easy beauty pageant answer. A fair and just society is possible, but we're not about to achieve it by smiling a lot and by listening to K'naan and his Wavin' Flag. Don't you think Ghandi was ever shit-shaking angry? I'll bet you all the time. He was angry enough to fight for what he wanted and we have to do the same.

It's laughable how my male friends looked so immediately threatened by the mere mention of feminism. What don't feminists have to be angry about? Women are sexualized and objectified. I don't feel safe when I walk home at night simply because I'm a woman. Our countries and the top corporate positions are presided over by men. And still men feel threatened by our straggling efforts to reach parity. If women are naturally quieter and more reluctant to speak, what happens when we silence the few feminists who are brave enough to use their voices?

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We were all out tonight because the Surrey Campus Committee organized a school dance and dinner. I unfortunately didn't know many people from this division of SFU, but Surrey is a tight-knit community and everybody already knew one another. HuckDuck was busy doing committee stuff during the event and the only other friend I had there was Bomberman, who couldn't dance because he was the DJ. Bomberman and I both work at CJSF so we have a burning hatred of Top 40 music and what they represent, but that's all he could play all night because that's what people requested.

Usually I dance up a storm because it's easier to pretend you enjoy the ear-splitting noise than it is to stand around awkwardly. But here I didn't feel like inserting myself into the unknown crowd for the purpose of dancing alone, so mostly I just sat besides Bomberman and tried to understand his DJ mechanics.

And as I looked into the anonymous, gyrating mass from behind the sound system table, I felt like I had gotten old very quickly. I never enjoyed the clubbing sort of lifestyle - it's like I missed out on being 19. I thought about all the things we ignore in order to have fun like this - our ready spendage of money on $80+ dresses, shitty corporate music, the makeup on my eyelids, unethically sourced food and I finally understood.

I do what I do because only a few, scatted others will. Activists are those who love people so much that they can no longer be one of them.

I haven't seen the girls for months so we're going out on the 20th for my brithday. KitKat found me on msn yesterday to say that she and the Tiffanies have decided that it'd be a good idea to make it a day of "dress up and pictures". 

I hoped my stunned pause had not been audible through internet chat, but KitKat knows me pretty well so it's a legitimate concern. How ironic to be dressing up for November transit, vegan dining and an Amnesty International film screening! What I had hoped would be a getaway escape from everyday superficiality, a time for genuine face-time with my bffs, is just another day of plastic and pretend.

Suddenly my most pressing concerns are mascara and my closet, and I don't want to, I resist, but I have to fit in with my friends. Sometimes not wanting to drink or play dress up makes me feel outdated and unhip, but mostly I just can't be bothered anymore. How can women ask to be taken seriously when we spend $50 on foundation? Mint even calls herself an environmentalist! It's disheartening to have of my only allies always smothered in eye shadow.

These girls are some of the best friends I have. They are the first at my side whenever anything happens. Maybe I'm just bitter because I fail at cam whoring. But mostly I'm frightened at the level of disconnect I have with the people I call my friends.