Although I have layered oppressions that have affected my ability to access my slice of the American Pie™, no issue has affected me more readily than my lack of white privilege. From being assumed to have “cheated” my way into programs for gifted children AND college (via affirmative action), to having my natural hair viewed as unprofessional amongst professional peers, to having people make negative assumptions about my competency level, interests, and job knowledge, to being viewed as naturally dangerous or threatening, my lack of white privilege has created numerous obstacles as I’ve struggled to successfully compete in a white dominated workforce. I am hoping that, through this campaign, I will begin to make some headway towards closing the gap that white privilege has created in my life.
Crowdfunding to buy white privilege, from here.
None of your elected backbench MPs have been told what Bill is to be debated on Monday. It’s Wednesday evening. Tomorrow, MPs are on a ‘one line whip’ ie they can return to their constituencies this evening.
Imagine how outrageous it would be, if tomorrow, the government were to announce emergency legislation to an empty chamber. Imagine if that emergency legislation was to be introduced on Monday or Tuesday, with the intention of it slipping through the Commons and the Lords in a single day. Imagine if that Bill was the deeply controversial Data Retention Bill.
It’s a Bill that will override the views of judges who have seen how the mass collection of your data breaches the human rights of you and your family.
In a moment of frustration with this Potato Salad project AND with Kickstarter, I decided to see how far we could take things. CLEARLY they must say “no” to something, right?
And so was born “Air”, a Kickstarter project created by me.
Air is exactly what it seems. I’m going to sell you… AIR.
2oz jars of fucking NOTHING.
The rewards are funny, all tongue in cheek. For example, I’ll go to Harry Potter land at Universal and get you some Air. Or I’ll go to the Florida swamp and get you some swamp air. (You can click this link and see the draft page for yourself…CLICK HERE!)
SO, I wrote up the rewards and the story and created the project, clicked submit, and waited to see what the response would be.
I thought “there’s no WAY it’ll be approved"… at least then I could have SOME hope for the future of Kickstarter. At least someone there would have some common sense. "They won’t allow me to just sell air. There’s no way.”
YEAH.
They APPROVED it.
They APPROVED me SELLING AIR.
I do wonder at what point the potato salad Kickstarter will go from “Hey, I totally contributed to this fun meme!” to “Hey, did I really give a stranger $10 for nothing?” Maybe I don’t have enough money to spare to really get the joke.
Kamentz had a stupid thought – that her lack of deep relationships with non-white sources reflected on those sources, rather than on her journalism. She aired her thought in public. People corrected her. She changed her thinking. That’s actually how social media is supposed to work for reporters. It’s not just a place where you broadcast your stories to a grateful audience, never embarrassing your employer or yourself. It’s a place where you can also think out loud and get feedback.
Nope the link to Bravo contest still don’t work, ordering it anyways. The question: I assume it is ok to use Lady Sabre &Pirates of Ineffable Aether in my Steampunk comics lecture/panel held in next september? But why steampunk especially?
1) OK, looking into why it’s working for me and not working for anyone else.
2) Absolutely. I’m honored.
3) Because I love the aesthetic, and the ability to revisit a very romanticized period with the liberty of pure-fiction to justify editing those elements of history that are, at their best, problematic.
Said on Twitter, but the link worked for me so that’s… two of us, at least?
As this and other circumstances forced me out of my career, I eventually quit my existing job. I founded a media company that is now one of the only independent platforms covering technology, culture and politics – and in doing so, have likely burned my last bridge with employment in the industry.
Now that I was my own boss, I felt free from the omnipresent threat of getting fired for my political speech, and it felt amazing. I started doing even more of that exact thing that women around here aren’t supposed to do: Get angry. Fight back. Speak my truth. Set boundaries. Take up digital space.
Be “visible.”
I am now one of the most hated people in the tech industry.
And rather than being an asset, visibility is itself a weapon against me.
The main way it’s different from This American Life is that instead of bringing you a different theme each week, every episode of Serial will bring you back not just to the same theme but to the same story, to bring you the next chapter. We’re starting with a crime story, that’ll run for about a dozen episodes. Our hope is that it’ll play like a great HBO or Netflix series, where you get caught up with the characters and the thing unfolds week after week, but with a true story, and no pictures. Like House of Cards, but you can enjoy it while you’re driving.