Bachelor in Paradise Treats the Idea of Sexual Misconduct as Entertainment (Vulture)
One day, I won’t include links to articles about the Bachelor franchise. Maybe. In the meantime, here’s a good piece about ‘Bachelor in Paradise,’ how garbage the franchise is, and how monstrously they’ve handled the sexual assault allegations that shut down the show for a few weeks:
From the moment Chris Harrison walked out onto an empty beach at the beginning of Monday’s episode, using a serious voice to look seriously into the camera and say serious things to the audience, the show began capitalizing on a winking, self-aware subtext about why viewers were watching. Harrison’s words were about the interrupted production and a promise for transparency about everything that happened during filming. But while the surface message was that the controversy would be addressed, the implicit message was, “you’ve tuned in to watch some extra-special drama, and we promise you we’ll deliver the goods.” And just in case it wasn’t absolutely unambiguous, let me be clear once again: The extra-special drama here is the allegation of sexual misconduct lingering in the air.
The Truth About Women and White Supremacy (The Cut)
A fascinating and super important piece about how we think about white supremacy and default to the maleness of the movement, when in fact it’s white women who have also powered the movement:
Undergirding this troubling belief that women aren’t central to racist movements is another: That racism occurs in a vacuum. Those who think white supremacy is a “white guys’ thing” must ask themselves about the nature of the fantasy they have constructed. Do we really believe the men holding torches in these photographs live in some sort of single-gendered society, or that the women they interact with hold no sway in their communities? There may be fewer of them marching with lit torches, but rest assured women are playing a powerful role wherever they can enact their agendas. If the 1920s Klan showed us anything, it’s that racist ideologies are nurtured in communities — not in isolation — and woven into a society’s very fabric. We will never understand the mechanisms that enact racism until we understand the whole societies from which they spring.
This is a must-read piece this week.
How Black Women’s Bodies Are Violated as Soon as They Enter School (The Guardian)
Part of a series of pieces on policing at the Guardian, this closing report talks about how black women’s bodies are not their own from a very young age. It also examines the use of force and the use of police inside school buildings. It is horrifying:
Alarmingly, among the violent policing tactics that have migrated from the streets to schools is indiscriminate use of stun guns, or Tasers, which are used to subdue people by firing barbs into them that deliver a jolt of electricity.
While researching a 2006 report on the US government’s failure to comply with the UN Convention Against Torture, I discovered a 2004 case in which a Miami-Dade police officer used a Taser against a 12-year-old girl, shocking her with 50,000 volts of electricity – for skipping school.
What did you read this week that got you incensed or thinking?
Hey, Library Girl! 