Here be dragons!

This tumblr is just going to be full of frivolous fandom fun for the most part rather than anything serious. There may be exceptions, like the occasional post about social justice and -isms in a fandom or pop culture context; for that reason, I'm warning that there may be triggers. I like Harry Potter, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Spider-Man, Game of Thrones, Aaron Eckhart, comics, TV Tropes, ancient Greece, ballet, films, roleplaying, food, examining race and ethnicity in entertainment, and many other things that aren't coming to mind right now because I'm writing this as I procrastinate going to sleep.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

Just as a final heads-up before I leave this account for good. And also in case anyone was wondering who the fuck spider-xan was, following people and liking/re-blogging their posts. No obligation to follow back, of course!

-- Xan

[xanthophiliac-blog]

If anyone suddenly gets followed by someone who goes by spider-xan, that's just me!

I'm just re-adding people I followed with this blog last year to my new one. Of course, there is absolutely zero obligation to follow back :)

[xanthophiliac-blog]

girl, i know what you me about all this SJ stuff burning you out. I've toned it down too (fyi I used to be jesifiable) for my own mental sake lol.

Hey there! And I definitely remember you, so I've followed you back on my other tumblr :) Which I guess you'd know by now.

And yeah, I've taken to mostly re-blogging fandom stuff and the occasional SJ thing, but I just can't engage with sexists and racists directly anymore because for some reason, while I can be the sort of person spoiling for a fight in certain contexts, I just can't mentally and emotionally deal with racist shit especially. But I do miss being able to discuss racism and anti-racism openly with other POC without having to think about, 'But what will my majority white followers thing?', even though I know I shouldn't be thinking that at all.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

[xanthophiliac-blog]

I AM ALIVE AND HAVE MOVED TUMBLRS

I don't know how many people still follow this one, seeing as I abandoned it almost a year ago after I was getting really stressed out dealing with racists and burned out to a point where logging onto tumblr brought me more grief than actual enjoyment.

BUT --

I did end up getting a new, more low-key tumblr over at spider-xan last summer, though I didn't really add anyone as I was mostly keeping to myself and still needed time away from anti-racism stuff. But I think I'm ready to get back into it now (though maybe not to the same extent as before because it was really burning me out) and honestly, I really miss having a dash that was majority POC and whom I could count on not saying cluelessly shitty things about race.

So yeah, if you still want to follow me, just follow the link to my new tumblr! I might go through and add people I used to follow with this one as well if I have time later.

[isaidnopeeking]

[xanthophiliac-blog]

“Obviously I’ll never be in anything with the commercial success that Harry Potter has but then again neither will anyone else.”

[mochidesu]

[xanthophiliac-blog]

I like how it looks like the eggs are eyes and the other food on top of the noodles is like a magnificent walrus moustache.

[crystalsavestheday-blog]

The Bechdel Test and Race in Popular Fiction

1. It has to have two POC in it.

2. Who talk to each other.

3. About something other than a white person.

No Joss Whedon show passes, neither does Supernatural, or Being Human.

Veronica Mars passes, but doesn’t pass the original Bechdel Test.

Check out a few more here.

[ai-yo]

Neither does True Blood Lafayette and Tara.

[idontexistanymoreforgetit]

[availableonitunes]

My power is water SWEEEET!!! My only weaknesses are butter knives 

(I like this “object location” meme)

[yamino]

My super power is American Sign Language! And my weakness is… microphones.

Huh, that’s kind of related, actually. XD

[girl-with-the-jigglypuff-tattoo]

my power is suction (-_-) my weakness is bras lawd

[luckythinks91]

okay so my powers is based off a physics book & my weakness is a cell phone.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

My powers are based on a table and my one weakness is pillows.

[apsies]

[daydreamingaimlessly-deactivate]

Berenstain Bears co-creator Jan Berenstain dies

Jan Berenstain, who with her husband Stan created the Berenstain Bears books that have charmed preschoolers and their parents for 50 years, has died. She was 88.

Mike Berenstain says his mother suffered a severe stroke on Thursday and died Friday without regaining consciousness. She was a longtime resident of Solebury in southeastern Pennsylvania.

The Berestains’ gentle stories of Mama Bear, Papa Bear, Brother Bear and Sister Bear address childhood subjects like coping with new siblings, summer camp and peer pressure.

Stan and Jan Berenstain, both Philadelphia natives, were 18 when they met on their first day at art school in 1941. Stan Berenstain died in 2005.

The first Berenstain Bears book, “The Big Honey Hunt,” was published in 1962. More than 300 titles have been released in 23 languages.

I used to love this when I was a kid. 

[xanthophiliac-blog]

RIP.

I remember reading these all the time when I was in primary school and loved them (my favourite was the junk food one), and you could never walk into a bookstore in those days without there being one of those big spinning wire racks with tons and tons of these books there, and I'd stand there reading through them.

[chescaleigh]

[metamorphoseandbodhi-deactivate]

Here’s the Oscars Comedic Opener, Starring Billy Crystal in Blackface

This isn’t blackface. This is Billy Crystal impersonating Sammy Davis Jr. as he’s done many times before on Saturday Night Live in the 1980s. He dawned makeup to become another individual who happens to be a dark-skinned African American. He hasn’t dawned theatrical makeup to display a mocking stereotyped stock caricature of “blackness” in a parody. He hasn’t even exaggerated Sammy Davis Jr.’s features!

If we’re really gonna condemn all blackface than we should denounce Robert Downey Jr. If there’s anyone more deserving it would be him in his portrayal of an insufferable overachieving white blond-haired blue-eyed Australian in Tropic Thunder (2008) in characterizing a stereotypical view of African American men in the Vietnam War era. But we can’t because in essence he’s making sport of actors in Hollywood that do such foolish insensitive acts.

If we’re really gonna condemn all blackface than we should also address the fact African Americans have, can, and still dawn blackface to this day. It’s only evolved from it’s original form.

Negative stereotypes of Black have become a staple of Black music videos that glorify “gangsterism”. In hp-hop/rap music and videos, the minstrel-show plantation has been born again as the “hood.” While the setting has changed from an idyllic plantation to the mean streets of urban America, the process is the same: a black culture is being marketed for white profit, with black performers portraying negative stereotypes. Performers claim that they represent authentic Black America, while critics decry the glorification of ugly caricatures and its effects on Black youth. [Source]

One of my pet peeves is a narrow-mindedness grasp of humor. People get bent outta shape scrutinizing the subject matter of humor without acknowledging the circumstances and symbolism.

[the-original-dtwps]

now mind you, I didn’t read past “this isn’t blackface” because that single line was so ridiculous that reading the rest is sure to enrage me and I just am not interest but…

it’s clear you have NO idea what blackface is.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

Yeah, you definitely don't want to read further -- this asshole actually went on to say something like, 'But Black people are guilty of blackface too!' and almost seems to imply they're worse for it than white people are :|

[cruelyouth-deactivated20120511]

Nope, sorry. You're racist, too.

It’s really hilarious to me when white people tiptoe around PoC and act afraid of us.

I notice this happens to me a lot, especially after a white person reads what I write online.  I’m able to express thoughts here that I’m not able to express in their world.  But them panicking really shows that they don’t understand a word I say. 

White people act so very afraid and start walking around eggshells that aren’t even there.  They really try to stress how not racist they are.  They want to make it very, very clear that they really, really do respect us and give us a bunch of flattery.  Whatever opinions they have (no matter if they’re okay or messed up) seem to be layered with extra coats of sugar. 

I’ll just go ahead and call you what you’re so afraid of being called — you’re a racist, alright?

And you are if you constantly tip toe and whisper around PoC.  It’s like you’re trying to hide something…

[a-bayani-deactivated20121004]

i find this happens a lot with white queers (esp the kind who self-describe as “radical” or what have you) in their interactions with me (flattery, talking about how not racist they are), while they ignore other POC in the same room, probs because i am “less threatening” with my lighter skin (and being “asian”) and figure it will be easier (and less uncomfortable for them) to gain my approval or some shit.

[joamettelikesthings]

Yeaaaah…. I would honestly just prefer them to be themselves and say something dumb as shit to me. Being down is about accepting that you’re gonna fuck up, there’s stuff you just aren’t in a position to fully grasp, and owning up when you’re called out.

[As always, followers, if any of this is gibberish to you, Ask. I honestly never get tired of explaining this stuff.]

[cruelyouth-deactivated20120511]

Bolding mine for emphasis.  Because YES.  It’s not about never making a mistake.  It’s about owning up to your shit when you do and being sincere about taking responsibility.  I could never trust a white person who said they have never messed up or say that they never will.  If people seem totally clean on the surface, they’re usually filthy underneath the facade.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

Personally, I only trust and like white people who readily admit that yes, they have said and done racist things before, and probably will continue to do so, but are also dedicated to unlearning racism as much as they can and being called out on it when it happens. I never trust anyone who insists that they have never ever said or done a racist thing in their life, and then get smug about that 'fact' -- that's just not possible with the way the world works, and if anything, people who act like that often end up being some of the most blatantly racist people I've ever me, especially considering how often the 'I've never said a racist thing ever' excuse comes up immediately after they said something racist and got called out for it.

[b-binaohan-deactivated20140530]

Intersectionality is not optional. It is not something you can take off and put back on again at will, when you feel like it. An intersectional lens should inform any critical evaluation of a subject, because these connections are key to understanding the web of oppression that weighs down on us all. These interconnections, too, are very weblike in their nature, because when you tweak one string, all the rest vibrate with it. There is no way to separate these things out from each other. People complain that people keep dragging ‘side issues’ into ‘their movement’ and they don’t understand that these issues are the movement. Because a movement that commits oppression in the name of liberation is not a good movement, to put it bluntly. We are more vocal about these issues because we have learned the cost of shutting up, because we constantly have to remind people, because the minute we stop, everything returns to the way it was, the status quo is reestablished, and the real structural and institutional problems that create inequality go, once again, uninterrogated. This is all connected. To misquote Patrick Henry for a moment, give me intersectionality, or give me death. This is not hyperbole: The current system, as it stands, is killing me. It is killing my people. It is killing the people I work in solidarity with. It is killing you. If you do not give me intersectionality, if you will not commit to being intersectional in your deeds, your thinking, your doing, all the time, no matter how you identify your politics, you are killing me.

Intersectionality Is Not Optional (via satifice)

[lifecrystals]

[TW: discussion of racism] Recently, my dashboard has been lit up here and there with some fast-flying reblogs of a video from one of Jane Elliott’s Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes workshops.  In these workshops, she conducts an experiment in which brown-eyed students are separated from non-brown-eyed students, and the non-brown-eyed students are bullied, harrassed, and oppressed throughout the course of the experiment.  In the particular video that was being reblogged, she conducted this workshop at a college (students could earn one credit).  One student, a young white female, was in the “blue-eyes” group, the oppressed group, and after a round of prejudiced, stern treatment from Jane Elliott, she burst into tears and walked out on the class, refusing later to apologize to the people of color in the class for what she had done. Some people on tumblr felt strongly about this.  Some people were of the opinion that Jane Elliott was being too mean, and that it was horrible what had been done to the white female in question, and couldn’t they see that there was something more significant going on with her pain, her reaction?  Look how upset she is: that’s how you know something just inappropriate was happening to her.  This was somehow harder on her than on other people.  See how she’s crying. Other people on tumblr, rightly, didn’t accept this.  The validity of someone’s suffering isn’t dependent on the crocodile size of their tears.  I say this not because I believe it was impossible that the white female in question was genuinely hurt and in pain.  I believe she was genuinely hurt and in pain.  But to say that her tears are a validation of that is to belittle the many other ways in which other people feel and express pain.  That’s saying that we should judge something as wrong or inappropriate not based on the action itself, but based on how the victim responds to it.  That’s saying that someone who faces this treatment every single day, who doesn’t burst into tears anymore because they’ve had to learn the hard lesson that, for them, looking outward for support won’t yield any, is somehow not hurting as much.  That oppression is less painful for someone who’s been dealing with it for twenty years than it is for someone who’s been under that strain for twenty minutes, who knows that eventually those twenty minutes will end.  That’s saying “I won’t believe your pain unless you advertise it to me so clearly that I can’t possibly deny it,” and then creating a world in which you punish someone for trying to show you their pain, by calling them hysterical, histrionic, overzealous, uppity, playing the race card, self-pitying, always looking for a handout.  Standing out will cost you your social standing.  Standing out will make you one of those types.  Keep your head down.  Don’t cause a stir.  But if you’re able to keep your head down, well, it can’t be that bad if I didn’t even notice it, right? So there we are.  That’s reality. Do you know why I say that that’s reality?  Because the truth is, we don’t live in a society where the majority of people will help, even if you do show them you’re in pain, if you’re not white.  People were very quick to rush to the defense of the white female in the video.  But I present, for you, Exhibit A, the video I’ve attached above.  It’s part of ABC’s “What Would You Do?,” the first part of a two-part experiment series called Shopping While Black.  Because there’s something about this video that I haven’t really seen addressed before when the video’s come up, but that’s very, very telling. In the video, a black female actor portrays a shopper attempting to shop at an upscale women’s boutique in SoHo, NYC.  She is confronted by two other actors: a white female store employee and a white male security guard.  This scenario is played out both while she is dressed in expensive fashions and straightened hair, and while she’s dressed in casual clothing with a puffy jacket and non-straightened hair. In the approximately 100 people exposed to these experiments, less than twenty people spoke up at all, and many didn’t try to help the woman, only argued with the store clerk after the woman had been thrown out of the store and the clerk was making further, blatantly racist statements to them at the checkout counter (they still intended to purchase clothing).  Most of the people who spoke up, apparently, were not white, though I gather that most of the shoppers were. Then, curiously, at the end of the video, there’s an encounter that catches my eye.  Two white women are standing near the woman who’s being harrassed, and one actually steps in to help her, walking together with her out of the store (her friend accompanies her).  Then, apparently suddenly feeling enraged and fired up about this, having seen the white woman stand up for the harrassed shopper, a large group of the other customers in the store, at least six or seven people, also all storm out in a huff and are eager to talk to the cameras outside about the horrible injustice that transpired. It’s remarkable.  Suddenly this was a gross injustice.  Suddenly they were activists.  Suddenly this was the kind of thing they simply wouldn’t stand for. Suddenly.  After long minutes of the harrassed woman decrying the injustice of what was being done to her, clearly, kindly, and sympathetically, after the clear anguish in her voice at being treated this way, they had stood by and done nothing, said nothing, and kept shopping.  But after just one white person stepped up and said, “no, this isn’t okay, you shouldn’t treat her this way,” then suddenly they all understood that it wasn’t okay and that what was happening to the black woman was racist harrassment. We are mostly deaf to people’s cries of pain. We all are, but those of us in this country who are white — we are particularly deaf to them.  Because we’re encouraged to be.  Because even when we see someone projecting their suffering in the exact terms we require it to be as clear and unambiguous as possible (visibly, kindly, clearly, with long explanations, with no aggression) — even when someone plays the game whereby their problems are dismissed if they don’t present them in a certain, very specific way and a very specific tone — white people often have a particular sort of dis-empathy to these things that comes with our white privilege.  We see someone being harrassed in a store and we think, “well, it can’t be because she’s black, I never see that kind of thing happening, and certainly not around here, there must be some other reason.  Probably she did something I don’t know about, something I didn’t see.  If they’re harrassing her, there’s probably something she did to bring attention to herself.” We see this because of the part that goes “I never see that kind of thing happening.”  And it’s because so many of us don’t.  We don’t have to.  No one treats us that way.  We’re white.  If someone stopped one of us, it was because one of us was stealing, and that’s justice.  White people get stopped too, if they’re dressed like white trash. (classism exists too, therefore racism doesn’t!)  Thus, when people are stopped for something, they probably stopped them because they did something wrong.  Thus, when black people get stopped, it’s probably because they did something wrong, just like everybody else. Only this does happen all the time, and we do, in fact, see it happening, but we’re so readily programmed to find other excuses for it that we’ll seize on any explanation for what’s happening other than racism, because we somehow believe that its being real, actual racism that counts is just so unlikely.  (This is because racism doesn’t actually happen very often!  Which — of course — is because we’re so good at finding reasons why so many instances of it don’t actually count, not, like, really really.)  If it counts, then all those other things would have to count too, and that seems just so unlikely. Besides, you had explanations for all those other times, didn’t you?  His car got pulled over, but it’s so dirty, I’ll bet lots of people with dirty old cars get pulled over.  Well, she really does have a tendency to sass off, doesn’t she?  She just wants attention.   He thinks he’s always the victim.  Those checks are random, obviously sometimes they’re going to get Muslims in them no matter what, anyhow.  You could fit a lot under a jacket like that.  It was only a joke, everyone knows we wouldn’t ever discriminate against you!  It’s probably just because of how they act, that wouldn’t happen to black people like the Obamas, so it’s not about race.  It was only a joke, he wouldn’t joke about that if he really felt that way.  It was only a joke, we were just laughing at stereotypes, she knows we don’t mean those things!  It was only a joke, it was only a joke, it was only a joke. And there’s a further statement that hides underneath those.  That statement is, of course it’s only a joke, because no one would dare to say that out loud.  I love this belief — it acknowledges the truth about racism that made the difference between buying a new shirt and walking out of the store for a group of six or so people.  That truth is, I’m not motivated by my desire to fight racism, I’m motivated by my desire not to be seen as a racist.  Because in this country, we don’t socially ostracize people for being racist.  We socially ostracize people for not pretending not to be racist.  Because the important thing is the lip service.  The important thing is not giving people of color an excuse to ask us for anything.  The important thing is making sure they haven’t got any proof. And no, many of us don’t sit around thinking racist thoughts, or at least we live in ignorance of the fact that so much of our thinking is racist.  We’re not all secret racists just hoping not to get caught.  But America is.  America, the white-privileging society, is racist, and just doesn’t want to be caught.  So we create a system where we make sure that yes, there are definitely some kinds of racism that we do agree are real racism, and those are bad things!  We create an incentive system where people live in fear of how awful it would be of them to actually be grouped in as a racist, because we’ve cherry-picked the worst, most egregious examples and defined those as being Serious Racism That’s Actually a Problem.  And that seems very, very bad.  But by doing so, we’re also creating a huge, yawning repository of all these other things that can happen that probably aren’t really racism and you’re just jumping to conclusions or making mountains out of molehills. And we’re trained to look at a mountain, no matter how cruel and painful, and say, “Well, this country doesn’t allow people to be overtly racist, no one would stand for that.  This is probably just a molehill.  I’m sure if I get enough information, I’ll find a reason why this is really just a molehill.  I won’t worry about it.” Then we see a white female crying, and we know — we just know — that her pain is real.  Her pain is a mountain.

[no-more-daysofevilexes-deactiva]

I really wish The Lizard wasn’t one of my favorite Silver Age Spider-Man villains. If I didn’t know much about him, I wouldn’t be nearly as worried about the upcoming Amazing Spider-Man film. 

The Curt Conners I’m familiar with and love is a family man, a little softspoken, and one of Spider-Man’s greatest allies. His alter ego is tragic, like Jekyll and Hyde, and it tears him apart from his family. 

The Curt Conners I’m seeing in the trailers (and maybe it’s the Curt Conners in the Ultimate universe, which I’ve never explored), is already suspicious and antagonistic towards Peter, and apparently has a vendetta against Peter’s dad. It looks like he uses his Lizard persona to further his dark agenda, and I haven’t seen/heard anything about Martha or Billy Conners. And…no lab coat?! Believe it or not, that really bothers me haha!

So…kinda totally different.

Which is a huge shame, because almost everything else I’ve seen about this movie looks great.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

The Lizard is hands-down my favourite Spider-Man villain, so I totally feel you here -- I was really worried and :| after the 'Ready to play God?' line in the tease that made him around like an evil scientist -- and I can answer some of the questions you had in this post!

Unless they decided to cut him out in the end, Billy is definitely going to be in it! They cast a kid named Miles Elliot (Eliot?) in the role last year. Nothing on Martha though, and I can't seem to find anything about her for the film -- I vaguely remember reading something about Curt being divorced somewhere, but that was so long ago and I've never been able to find the reference again that I wonder if I'm mixing up rumours and speculation with actual facts. But yeah, I'd love it if they kept the family dynamic that's so important to the character.

I don't think they're really using USM!Curt as the template, aside from a vague connection with Peter's father (and in the comics, they never worked with each other so much as Curt used Richard's research for his own project long after his death and continued on his work on another one) -- he didn't show up much in the Ultimate comics, actually, but I recall he was friendly with Peter (one drunken rant aside) until the Carnage incident.

That said, I read some other interviews with Rhys Ifans and, I think, Marc Webb that mentioned that Curt will be a good person and sympathetic, which makes me worry less about how he comes off in the trailers at times and whatnot; though at the same time, yeah, I'm sort of worried about the vendetta thing -- but maybe it's a case of the Lizard persona making him aggressive in ways he wouldn't be otherwise.

I read somewhere that the Lizard will be 9 feet tall, which I guess would explain the lack of a lab coat -- but there was a toy somewhere where he DID have the lab coat, so I guess it's possible we'll see it briefly at the start of a transformation? It'd be a nice nod to the comics. I suspect the practical reason for the lack of a lab coat is a CGI thing.

[xanthophiliac-blog]

JUST IN CASE ANYONE WAS WONDERING --

-- I AM STILL AROUND! Nothing bad has happened, but I ended up taking an impromptu tumblr hiatus to try and catch up on some stuff elsewhere on the internet, and then I sort of forgot about it, and now I'm still behind on stuff, so I'll be away for a little while long :| By behind, I mean like, a month and a half behind :X

But yeah, I'm fine and everything -- though that reminds me of how nervous is makes me when people I know online disappear suddenly, because I may very well have no way to find out if something happened to them. And now that I think about it, I don't think I have any sort of plan in place for people I know online to find out if something really bad DID happen to me. But at the same time, I don't know anyone IRL I'd trust with stuff like my account passwords :|

[still-kind-of-numol-deactivated]

[via Dread Times (link to post)]

AFAICT the new deadline is the 28th [of February].  they’re only at 69% of their goal as of now, please pass this around and donate if possible.

The Davis family has had to bury three warriors for justice in the past seven months. Virginia Davis, the matriarch of the family, passed in April, just two weeks after the US Supreme Court denied Troy’s final appeal, paving the way for the state of Georgia to set a new execution date. According to Martina, her mother died of a broken heart—she couldn’t bear another execution date. Troy was executed on September 21, despite an international outcry over executing a man amid such overwhelming doubt. Troy’s sister Martina succumbed to her decade-long battle with cancer on December 1, exactly two months after her brother Troy’s funeral, leaving behind a teenaged son. There are still outstanding medical and funeral bills for Martina that the Davis family must pay. The Davis family has had to bear more tragedy and sorrow than any family should ever have to. Together, we can ensure that the financial aspect of these losses will not be a burden to them. Any amount will be highly appreciated. Any questions can be directed to Jen Marlowe at [email protected]

ALSO: comment left by Jen Marlowe, with info for mailing checks:

checks should be made out to the “The Martina Davis-Correia fund” and can be sent to: Kimberly Davis PO Box 2105 Savannah, GA 31407

ALSO IMPORTANT: the Dread Times post says that after the deadline, “donations can be made via Kim Davis’s paypal account, at [email protected]”.

[the-original-dtwps]

Fund for Troy Davis’s family