(no subject)

[gwydion]

* "North Koreans express frustration over new government foreign-currency collections:" http://www.dailynk.com/english/m/read.php?num=14814&cataId=nk01500

* "Trump announces designation of North Korea as state sponsor of terrorism:" https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/20/trump-says-hell-designate-north-korea-as-state-sponsor-of-terrorism-250344

* "59,000 Haitians living in U.S. must leave within 18 months, Trump administration says:" http://www.latimes.com/politics/washington/la-na-pol-essential-washington-updates-50-000-haitians-living-in-u-s-must-1511223433-htmlstory.html

* "Daughter of Haitians, 10, urges Trump to extend families' protected status:" https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/20/haiti-immigrants-trump-ronyde-christina-ponthieux

* "Trump Defends Roy Moore Amid Sexual Assault Allegations: 'He Totally Denies It':" https://www.npr.org/2017/11/21/565760674/trump-defends-roy-moore-amid-sexual-assault-allegations-he-totally-denies-it

* "Judge issues blow against Trump's sanctuary city order:" http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/21/politics/trump-sanctuary-cities-executive-order-blocked/index.html

* "Trump calls on NFL to suspend Raiders' Marshawn Lynch:" http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/20/politics/trump-twitter-marshawn-lynch/index.html

* Both sides are already questioning the veracity, but it is amusing. "Dem senator: Gary Cohn faked a bad connection to get off phone with Trump:" http://thehill.com/homenews/house/361553-dem-senator-gary-cohn-faked-a-bad-connection-to-get-off-phone-call-with-trump

* This is really unfair to Kindergartners. "Sources: McMaster Mocked Trump’s Intelligence At A Private Dinner:" https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/sources-mcmaster-mocked-trumps-intelligence-in-a-private?utm_term=.idYbm7NB0#.tmvZKL2G4

* "Trump campaign adviser Carter Page met with Hungarian officials in Budapest:" http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-campaign-adviser-carter-page-held-high-level/story?id=51284300

* Damn. "Yellen Says She’ll Leave Fed Once Powell Is Sworn In as Chairman:" https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-20/yellen-says-she-ll-leave-fed-once-powell-sworn-in-as-chairman

* "Kushner didn't disclose outreach from Russian 'godfather' to campaign:" https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/kushner-failed-disclose-outreach-putin-ally-trump-campaign-n822021

* TW: Pedophilia. "Conway on Moore: 'We want the votes' for tax bill:" http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/20/politics/kellyanne-conway-roy-moore-fox-interview/index.html

* "Former ethics chief files complaint after Conway attacks Alabama Dem:" http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/361528-former-ethics-chief-files-complaint-after-conways-comments-on-alabama

* "FCC plans total repeal of net neutrality rules:" https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/20/net-neutrality-repeal-fcc-251824

* "NY AG probing ‘massive scheme’ to influence FCC with fake net neutrality comments:" http://thehill.com/policy/technology/361509-ny-ag-probing-massive-scheme-to-influence-fcc-on-net-neutrality-with-fake

* The current Republican tax plan will raise taxes on the bottom 50% of earners while giving the rich a massive tax cut.

* "House Tax Bill Is Littered With Loopholes for Wall Street’s Wealthiest:" https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-21/tax-loopholes-for-wall-street-s-wealthiest-loom-in-house-bill

* If you can’t protest any or all of the above in person, here are some other options:

Call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to the representative of your choice.
This App phones your rep for you: http://takeastance.us/
Here is one that will send your reps a fax: https://resistbot.io/

* "Montana Rep. Greg Gianforte Lied to Police About Assaulting a Reporter:" https://splinternews.com/montana-rep-greg-gianforte-lied-to-police-about-assaul-1820573454

* "MSNBC awaits NYT probe of allegations against Glenn Thrush:" http://thehill.com/homenews/media/361210-msnbc-to-await-nyt-probe-of-allegations-against-glenn-thrush

* TW: Pedophilia. "Moore campaign: 'We don't believe these women':" http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/21/politics/roy-moore-campaign-allegations/index.html

* "Keystone XL pipeline wins green light in Nebraska — but may face new hurdles:" https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/20/nebraska-approves-keystone-xl-pipeline-250341

* I woke up randomly exhausted with no obvious cause, which is a thing that happens with a body like mine. I did achieve phone bureaucracy, have secured pie for tomorrow, and did a bunch of correspondence. I am still scary behind on news, for which I apologise. We may be about to be gifted a new stripey cat. *fingers crossed*

* I was really into this movie called Ghost Story when I was eleven. Now you may be asking yourself, what kind of parents are letting a kid that young watch a movie with that much nudity and sex, including male full frontal. The answer is, I was a quiet, responsible kid who was sneaky as hell and had access to cable. <.< >.>

Anyway, I haven't seen this movie since it fell out of rotation at some point in the first half of the '80's and always intended to see if it stood up to time and adulthood. I am watching it now. Look, it was released in '81 so the special effects don't hold up particularly well, which is as expected. It is beautifully shot though and the set designs/art direction is lovely. It stars people like Fred Astaire and Douglas Fairbanks Jr, though I am in no position to evaluate the acting, because so much of this is interior furniture in my brain. It is a sausage fest, and I suspect a lot of the female nudity was for straight male titilation, though despite the male nudity, there was nothing to tittillate me as the young male lead who is trying to figure things out is as unappealing to be now as he was to me then and his brother is even less appealing. I was not getting out of it, what one might think an eleven year old would get out of it.

The thing is, watching it, I was not sympathizing with any of the men. I did not like crappy David and his crappy brother, Donnie. As charming as Fred Astaire could be, the Chowder Club did a terrible thing and they were getting what they deserved. Yes, visiting punishment on sons for the sins of a father is not cool, but they were mediocre guys anyway in every respect from what I could see in the narrative. Like, do they deserve the stuff happening to them? Probably not, but they aren't people I'd spend time with on purpose.

No, I was all about Alma. I liked her. I got her. I got why she felt the way she did and why she did the things she did. I appreciated her sense of agency, her confidence. I was furious on her behalf. To me, her nudity existed as contrast. It was the weapon that was left her when all else was taken away but her anger. This, eleven year old me could understand and identify with, though I was not yet good looking to any but the pedophiles. It was a weapon I would understand and use later in a few years as an unnervingly confident teen with a strong sense of personal agency. Anger was something I lived and breathed. Her anger was as justified as mind and I was all for her getting her vengeance once I knew it's reasons in later watchings. Did I at eleven get all the nuances of the Chowder Club original sin? No, but I get the text of it and all the important bits of the subtext. My angle of vision is a little deeper now, but I got the dynamic and the gendered ugliness just fine back then. I think that's why it haunted me so, the fundamental masculine stupidity of it, the way she was clearly worth ten of them and deserved so much better.

The essential power of truth and the telling of Story, the revealing of what was hidden changing everything? That too spoke to me.

Does it hold up in modern context? I can't say. I do not think it's a movie that could or should be made now. It still has something though, and I'm not sorry I saw it again for all it's flaws.

* An old RL friend of mine wrote this. It's M/M erotica with quality writing, world building, and a plot. It is right now free and will be for the next 3-4 days along with all her other things. "Outlaws (Ashfall Book 1):" https://www.amazon.com/Outlaws-Ashfall-Book-Michaela-Holland-ebook/dp/B0774VX55H/ref=la_B0777FHWLC_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1511420655&sr=1-2

Second installment: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077P2VH38/ref=la_B0777FHWLC_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1511420655&sr=1-3

"New Prospects:" https://www.amazon.com/New-Prospects-Michaela-Holland-ebook/dp/B077N4YH7M/ref=la_B0777FHWLC_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1511420655&sr=1-4

"The Price of His Kiss (City of Pantheons Book 1):" https://www.amazon.com/Price-Kiss-City-Pantheons-Book-ebook/dp/B077D1BZD9/ref=la_B0777FHWLC_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1511420655&sr=1-1

* I have been reading the fascinating Indexing, which had me thinking about the Little Mermaid. Not the movie, which I've never seen as it came out when I was in college and was rumored to have a happy ending, but the original tale, by Hans Christian Anderson. This was the one of all the fairy tales, and nursery rhymes, and literary outings on that same continuum that resonated most with me as a kid. I think my father first read it to me when I was three, and it stayed a favorite until I got old enough to be rereading things like Dumas and Tolkien on my own, and my father was just reading to my sitter. (Later I would read to her in his place, but that is another story).

The Little Mermaid really spoke to me, and I learned so much from it. The longing to be and do something new and to travel places far away. The important lesson that no matter how much you love someone, they may not ever love you back. That you cannot, do not, should not try to own someone else no matter how perfect that image of you together might be in your head. That you don't get to make other people's decisions for them, but you do get to decide how you react to those decisions. That every single one of us gets to write our own story, make our own decisions, control our own narrative of who we are and who we are going to be by the choices we make and how we deal with the consequences of those choices. That you can't hang all of your future and happiness on a single person.

These are incredibly important lessons, that I think every child should walk out into the world armed with. I think thy are incredibly important when those children grow into teens and adults and try to date other people, but they are incredibly important long before that. This story helped save me when I was eight years old. This story influenced me to lift my head up and decide that while they could pretty much do what they wanted to me, they could not tell me who I was. I got to decide who I was. I got to decide my own story and what it meant. I got to chose to resist and how. They could physically imprison my body, but not my thoughts and they could not stop me using their limits against them, and surviving. I would not consent to my own oppression. I would not let them simplify me and define me.

I decided to be the hero of my own story, and that is fundamentally what saved me. No one was coming to save me, but I would do what I could to survive and save my self. I would do it honorably. I would do it cleverly. I would do it.

Many things went into that decision, but I think a life line tossed across the nearly a century between his death and my birth, by a gay man who loved a straight man who could never love him back played a part in shaping me so fundamentally that I could have that perspective at eight, and at twelve, and at fifteen, when it really mattered. Story has a magic to it, and never let anyone tell you otherwise, because the stories we tell about ourselves to ourselves are the most powerful ones of all.

*****
* Full list of Resistance and charity links has been migrated to my profile as it was getting out of hand.

* "Help us stop the humanitarian crisis on Manus:" https://www.asrc.org.au/donate-now/

* "RISE (Refugees, Survivors and Ex-Detainees):" https://www.givenow.com.au/riserefugee/donate

* How to help Rohingya refugees: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/world/asia/rohingya-aid-myanmar-bangladesh.html?emc=edit_nn_20171012&nl=morning-briefing&nlid=50784086&te=1&_r=0

* A list of organizations to help you run for office: http://lovingmyselfishard.tumblr.com/post/167330144634/psst-hey

* Resistance links for the tax cuts for the rich: http://gwydionmisha.tumblr.com/post/166977878817/fullhalalalchemist-the-gop-is-aiming-for-a-65vc

* Republicans are trying to kill library funding. Help us save the libraries. http://www.ala.org/advocacy/advleg/federallegislation/fight-for-libraries

* Call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to the representative of your choice.

* This App phones your rep for you: http://takeastance.us/

* Here is one that will send your reps a fax: https://resistbot.io/

* Help pay for cat food, litter, meds, medical copays: Paypal Lethran@gmail.com

* Birthday/Solstice master list: https://gwydion.dreamwidth.org/1925021.html

* Want Game of Thrones without the creepy? We need new players. We are very inclusive. "Game of Bones MUSH:" gobmush.wikidot.com