I read a lot. This is a selection of what I read this week (10/12/20 through 10/18/2020) that I think you should read, too.
Articles
*Tom Gjelton’s White Supremacist Ideas Have Historical Roots In U.S. Christianity for NPR: Before anyone starts sending me hate mail, yes, I’m aware of how many American Christians are actively fighting against racism and other forms of hate. I’m honored to hold many of them as dear friends. However, the presence of good souls doesn’t and can never change the fact that white supremacist ideals in the United States have so often gone preached on the pulpit. Progress can’t be made without acknowledging history.
*Megan Thee Stallion’s Why I Speak Up for Black Women for The New York Times: Around election season especially, white liberals and progressives will often cheer, “Black women will save us all!” But that’s an entirely unfair ask, to burden one demographic with the expectation to “save” others who don’t even bother to acknowledge their own painful experiences. Megan Thee Stallion points out this hypocrisy and shares how her openness about a domestic (not intimate partner) violence led to fetishization and further abuse—a commonality among Black women, particularly those active on social media.
*John Meyer’s Don’t freak out, but it’s almost time for tarantulas to crawl around Colorado in search of love for The Denver Post: I had no idea that a major tarantula “migration” (it’s not a mass migration, sadly) happened annually, and now I’m obsessed with the idea of traveling to go see it someday.
*Simon Moya-Smith’s Native American fry bread is the food of our oppression. It’s also delicious, so we’re reclaiming it. for NBC News: Fry bread’s history is inextricably tied to the indigenous prison camps that eventually became reservations, forcing communities to create poorly-nutritive sustenance with unhealthy rations. This piece looks at reclamation efforts to keep the circumstances of fry bread’s creation at the forefront while still honoring its place in indigenous cuisine.
Comics and Zines
As always, my weeklies/weeklies-ish:
*Huda Fahmy’s Yes I’m Hot in This
*Phylecia Miller and Jules Rivera’s Hi, Phylecia!
*Taejoon Park’s Lookism
*Jules Rivera’s Mark Trail (New this week!)
*Linda Sejic’s Punderworld
*Jessi Sharon’s The Sea in You
*Rachel Smythe’s Lore Olympus
*Sensaga’s Ham and Mat
*Steenz’s Heart of the City
Indigenous Action’s Voting is Not Harm Reduction zine provides an overview of American colonialist violence against indigenous communities and explains how viewpoints painting voting certain ways as inherently “harm reduction” erase their reality.
Short Stories
Since Halloween isn’t happening this year, I was grateful that Houston Great Books Council* chose Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Black Cat” for one of its Celebration of Literary Discussion reads to help us all get into the spirit. I hadn’t read the story before, but it shares the theme of slow-simmering madness eventually leading to a crime confession with Poe’s more well-known “The Telltale Heart.” A seasonally perfect, slow-burning mood piece about impulsive murders most foul and ambiguous supernatural activity.
Content warning for graphic depictions of violence against animals, however.
*Full disclosure, but I’m a board member.
See you next week, fellow bookish buffs!
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