Tag: reading
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Myriam Gurba – Creep
I started reading Creep last year when I picked up an ARC from a local bookstore. It was a rough start, getting used to the way Myriam introduces other narratives into the story she’s telling, but I’ve been actively reading it the past few weeks. By the end of the collection, I was all up…
Christine
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David Bell: The Request
Did I like this book? Eh. Did I hate it? Nope. The Request was actually a fairly well-paced read. It took me about a month (of Mon-Fri, 15-30 min sessions) to finish. If it was awful, it would’ve taken me much longer; if it was great, I would’ve zoomed through it. I guess my biggest…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. Liberated Relationships, Expanded and Principles in Practice
We’re down to the last two pieces I want to discuss in Pleasure Activism. Liberated Relationships, Expanded adrienne maree brown’s principles for liberated relationships: Liberated Relationships: “[R]elationships that center the freedom and transformation of all partners, romantic, platonic, political, familial, or some combination of these.” (p.403) Radical honesty “No omissions, no white lies, no projections.…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. brief thoughts on drugs, mental health, and giving myself away
Two more and we’re done. Promise. The Politics of Radical Drug Use Growing up, drugs were always off the table. I had friends who smoked weed occasionally, but nothing harder than that (that I was aware of). As an adult, drugs are still off the table. I do believe people deserve respect and access to…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. Use Your Voice
“Our silence is a survival strategy. Our silence has protected us against potential violence, an unfortunately common response of patriarchy and/or other kinds of power when met with rejection. Our silence protects us from being rejected. Our silence upholds social norms that teach us that it’s more important to be polite than to be honest,…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. Liberating Your Fantasies & Pornography and Accountability
We’re discussing two pieces here because they go together so seamlessly. Liberating Your Fantasies “Somewhere along the journey, through attraction we feel for others, media images, and healthy and/or unhealthy interactions with those older than us, visuals and story lines groove a pathway for desire in our brains. We begin to have certain scenarios that…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. From #MeToo to #WeConsent
adrienne maree brown’s keys to consent-based pleasure: Self-Awareness – “It is a gift to be in touch with your own desire, to know when you do and don’t want something… The first step of consent is tuning into your own desire, being able to feel a distinct yes or no in your system.” (p.197) Oh,…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. A Pleasure Philosophy: A Conversation with Ingrid LaFleur
This piece is a short conversation between adriennce maree brown (“amb” below) and Ingrid LaFleur. Per Ingrid’s website, she is a “curator, design innovationist, pleasure activist and Afrofuturist committed to exploring and implementing forward-thinking solutions across multidisciplinary industries including but not limited to art, technology, education, social enterprise, and finance.” amb. What is your pleasure…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power, Audre Lorde
This post is quote-heavy. There were so many great sequences of thought that I couldn’t split up. I was screaming “Yes! YES!!” every few lines. Even sent a voice note to a friend. I tried really hard not to read the entire piece to my friend in that voice note, and I tried really hard…
Christine
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Pleasure Activism. Who taught you to feel good?
A Question: How would we organize and move our communities if we shifted to focus on what we long for and love rather than what we are negatively reacting to? (p.23) This is such an important question, both for the wider community (whichever communities you are part of) and for us individually. When I was…
Christine
Christine Gabrièlle 