The world’s most misunderstood novel: “The Great Gatsby is synonymous with parties, glitz and glamour – but this is just one of many misunderstandings about the book that began from its first publication.”
Geekery
Whatever I’m geeking out about at the time.
📚 7/2021: Bone Silence by Alastair Reynolds ⭐️⭐️⭐️ #PKDickAward nominee 1/6
A satisfying end to the Revenger trilogy. Not all questions answered, but those most central to the main adventure are. If the “high seas adventure in space” conceit works for you, it’s a good series.
Once More With Feeling: Joss Whedon is a Jerk
For no reason at all (ahem), some old links I had laying around…
From 2017: My new album…
My new album, Joss Whedon Kind Of Really Sucks and Even Though I Have and May Continue to Enjoy Some of His Shows or Aspects of His Shows That Doesn’t Mean That I Don’t Need To Recognize How They Have A Lot of Problematic Elements, is coming out next week!
From 2017: I’m looking at screenshots…
The problem is that at some point in his career, Joss became so intent on the masochistic fantasy of being hated by strong women for being a nerd that he spent a decade writing stories about violating those women to ensure they would hate him.
From 2009 (content warning for late 00’s-era Cracked.com over-the-top snark with lots of I’m-cool-because-I-swear profanity and problematic language): 5 Reasons It Sucks Being a Joss Whedon Fan
Yeah, Buffy kicked unholy ass, Zoe was Mal’s Terminatrix-like enforcer, Faith begat Echo and Echo is the baddest ass Kung Fu Whore TV has ever seen, and yet, aside from the fact these girls have done some push ups and punched masculinity in its shriveled balls time and again, the idea that Whedon is some sort of hyper-feminist stinks….
I’m not mocking or disparaging those who are just now learning just how problematic Joss Whedon is (though it’s presented in a different context, I always try to keep XKCD’s Ten Thousand comic in mind); nor do I look down on those who still find things in Whedon’s work that they enjoy (there’s still a lot of Buffy that I enjoy, from the original film through most of the show and Angel).
I’ve said before that I believe it’s entirely possible to enjoy problematic media and media created by problematic creators; you just have to be willing to recognize those areas where they fall down, rather than ignoring or glossing over them because of the parts you enjoy.
Much of Whedon’s work, particularly Buffy, was groundbreaking and formative for many people, and that can make it hard to recognize and confront the failings of both the media and the creator. (Most recently, Harry Potter fans sure know something about this situation.) So if these things are new to you and you’re struggling with how to process them, and how they may affect your enjoyment of the media you grew up with? You’re not alone.
Maybe you’ll keep these things as part of your life, maybe you’ll decide you’d rather move on to new things and leave these as part of your past. As long as you’re recognizing why and making these decisions for yourself, there’s no wrong answer (though some may try to convince you otherwise).
As I noted above, there’s a lot about Buffy that I still enjoy; similarly, there’s a lot about the Harry Potter universe that I still enjoy. For myself, I’m not going to wholeheartedly expunge either from my life. But neither will I shy away from recognizing where they don’t hold up to my current ideals and standards, and I will continue to minimize the financial support I give to their creators. What you decide, of course, is up to you.
The two top things I want from Apple’s Music (formerly iTunes) app:
- Functional search. The drastic decrease in functionality in the iTunes to Music transition is incredibly frustrating.
-
Either a ‘tag’ field, or for the ‘Genre’ field to be tags, rather than single-value.
🎶
Difficult Listening Hour 2021.02.06
Unrehearsed, seat-of-the-pants, let’s-see-what-happens mixing. You never know what might fall into one of these!
📚 6/2021: Shadow Captain by Alastair Reynolds ⭐️⭐️⭐️
The central book of a trilogy, between two #PKDickAward nominees (one in 2018, one this year). More YA adventures on the high seas but in space, in a far-future pseudo-18th century society among a shattered solar system.
Jelli M1 Mask Unboxing and Review
A few months ago, I backed the Jelli M1 mask project on Kickstarter. The mask itself showed up today, so I put together this video unboxing and quick review.
Links:
- Jelli M1 website
- Original Kickstarter campaign page
- CNAS certification report
- Mask It or Casket shirt by Oakthorn Studios
- DJ Wüdi on Twitch
- Background music track: Deep Image (Releveled) by UBE (no link available)
All of this year’s Philip K. Dick Award nominees have arrived! Two months to get through them all (plus two more that are predecessors of books in this stack). Will I make it? 📚
Difficult Listening Hour 2021.01.30
Unrehearsed, seat-of-the-pants, let’s-see-what-happens mixing. You never know what might fall into one of these!
📚 5/2021: Moonshot: The Indigenous Comics Collection, Vol. 3 edited by Elizabeth LaPensée and Michael Sheyahshe ⭐️⭐️⭐️
The latest in this series of comic anthologies written and illustrated by indigenous creators drawing upon their cultures to create SF/F short pieces.
