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“The overwhelming desire to protect young girls from the corruptions of pornography, or songs, or movies, or pop stars, or the patriarchy, or the pressures of boys, is no different or more pressing than the things conservatives and sentimentalists have been trying to protect girls from for time immemorial: the giant, unspeakable crisis critics have constantly and luridly imagined looming over our young girls is otherwise known as life.”

— What Caitlin Flanagan’s new book “Girl Land” gets wrong about girls.

“We are often told that queer theory lacks “clarity.” But technical clarity and journalistic accessibility are not the same, and the attack on difficult style has often been a means to reassert the very standards of common sense that queer theory rightly challenged.”

— Queer and Then? - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education

“Young people are going through their mirror stage on Facebook, and bending the mirror to reflect what they’d most like to see.”

— Born for Reality: Courtney Stodden and Tavi Gevinson - Hollywood Prospectus Blog

“The central problem of the Ailey repertory is that it presents no problems. Good or bad, taxing or simple, every work is accessible and appealing; I know of no piece in which the audience is challenged, made to feel uncomfortable, asked to work or puzzle a bit.”

—

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater as Hit Maker - NYTimes.com

Really interesting article.

Seven Questions Over Breakfast with Jon Klassen

I Want My Hat Back is a wonderful, wonderful book. I want an excuse to buy 12 copies.

“We are frantically digging to keep the tunnel from caving in — digging for air, not treasure. And what’s really hemming us in is an unwillingness to eat dirt, to embrace precarity “as the condition of being and belonging,” instead of clinging desperately to the paradox of predictability and security — “buy this car to go to work, go to work to pay for this car.”

— The New Inquiry

An (incomplete) guide to Seattle, for broke-ass MLA attendees

I know that MLA would be cheaper if I still lived in Seattle and could put you up in my basement, but since I moved away, you’ll have to settle for this list.

First off, where you’ll be: the Convention Center is downtown. Downtown is a nice enough place for mall shopping and chain restaurants, but you’re not allowed to judge Seattle on downtown. After dark, downtown just doesn’t do Seattle justice.

Seattle is a city of neighborhoods. The neighborhoods that adjoin downtown are:

Pioneer Square (the old downtown) - Now has a lot of industry and good lunch spots, but no real reason to go there unless you have time for the Underground tour.)
Belltown - This is right next to Pike Place Market and along the waterfront. Some lovely restaurants, but likely to be pricier for both drinks and food. You may end up here, but if you can steer people in another direction, do.
International District - Could be a longish walk, but great for food. Samurai Noodle for ramen, Jade Garden for dim sum (long wait, but worth it), and lots of other great food. Uwajimaya is the Japanese grocery store; great place for cheap gifts and foods you might not find in Connecticut.
Capitol Hill - This is where my heart is. (On the way to Capitol Hill from Downtown is First Hill; they blend together.) First/Capitol Hill are the first residential neighborhoods in Seattle, and Capitol Hill is now combination college/hipster and gay neighborhood.

Two notes about Seattle:

People in Seattle like their personal space, and can seem a little chilly. Don’t be offended.
It’s not Pike’s Place. It’s a market on a street called Pike Place; hence, Pike Place Market. Drives the locals (aka me) nuts when you stick the stupid apostrophe-s on there.

Now, places to know. Right up the hill from the Convention Center is the Pike-Pine corridor. If you go this direction instead of towards downtown, the food/drink options are much better (and likely cheaper).

Food and drinks within a 20 min walk:

For a very reasonably priced Italian dinner, hit Ristorante Machiavelli. It can handle groups or be romantic, and you may need to wait a bit. But you can also sit and eat in the bar, and if you wait it out the food is wonderful and the house wine is pretty cheap.
For a cheap and awesome lunch, Marination Station is Hawaiian/Korean/Mexican. Used to be a food truck, but now it’s a little storefront above the QFC on Broadway. Delicious and cheap. It’s about a 20 minute walk from downtown.
For a few hours of downtime, head to Bauhaus. The coffee is not great, but the books and the exposed brick are cozy, and the people-watching is unbeatable. Plus they’re open late, so if you have stuff to work on and your hotel room is depressing, this is your spot.
For a close, hearty lunch, the Baguette Box is great. Everything on the menu is wonderful, and the vegetarian options are excellent.
For really good coffee, go up the Pike/Pine corridor to Victrola or Stumptown. Don’t order fancy Starbucks-named things; order a simple espresso drink (like a latte) or a drip coffee.

If folks are interested, I’ll follow up with some good spots for drinks.

“Go on the Useless Presents.”

“Bags of moist and many-colored jelly babies and a folded flag and a false nose and a tram-conductor’s cap and a machine that punched tickets and rang a bell; never a catapult; once, by mistake that no one could explain, a little hatchet; and a celluloid duck that made, when you pressed it, a most unducklike sound, a mewing moo that an ambitious cat might make who wished to be a cow; and a painting book in which I could make the grass, the trees, the sea and the animals any colour I pleased, and still the dazzling sky-blue sheep are grazing in the red field under the rainbow-billed and pea-green birds.”

Dylan Thomas, of course.

Merry Christmas, all.

“Sebelius’ reason: Some girls as young as 11 are physically capable of bearing children, and Plan B’s maker didn’t prove that younger girls could properly understand how to use this product without guidance from an adult.”

—

- NYTimes: U.S. Rejects Plan to Widen Availability of Morning-After Pill

I’ve read this sentence like four times now, and I can’t make any sense of it. Some girls as young as 11 are physically capable of bearing children…so we should make sure they have to? Presumably the implication is that children who might be sexually active are too dumb to handle emergency contraception, so we should make sure they have to get an abortion or carry a baby to term instead.

Can you explain this to me in a way that makes it anything but malicious, cynical nonsense?

“Another nice culture jam or whatever would be a remix or mashup of all these songs without the lines where they talk about dancing – what’s left would be expertly produced war cries. I would love to go on a march with Rihanna at my back reminding me “there’s only one thing on my mind/ who’s gonna run this town tonight.” Keeps you focused. If someone took these insurrectionary fragments and stitched them together into a dance megamix, we’d have a genuinely dangerous piece of music.”

—

The New Inquiry - Don’t Stop Beliebing

Seriously, this article.