aletheia_shortwave

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By aletheia_shortwave • 13 years ago

Techno-Feminist Utopia: The Gift of Monstrosity

Hey Feministing Community!
This April 17th, I will release a short documentary-style film, ‘The Gift of Monstrosity.’ The film is based on research I did in a graduate-level Genocide and Human Rights course about the idea that genocide or ethnic cleansing can happen to queer people. Check out the trailer!

Taking an artistic and philosophical approach, we discuss the relationship between religious truth and medical truth as both affect gender. We question the historical target of both religious and scientific “correction” — a “monster” — an androgynous, lesbian, aggressive woman of color who is stereotypically associated with the body and the “primitive.” The question for our personal lives, is how to see our “monstrosity” as a gift and not something that needs be “fixed” or “cleansed” from society, whether through religious salvation or medical cure. The broader question is whether there is a more positive role religion can play in our lives — and what the corresponding new, liberated relationship to medical technology would look like. We have several other films available at our Youtube Channel, Techno-Feminist Utopia .

Feel free to send critical feedback! Thanks for reading.

Alex

By aletheia_shortwave • 13 years ago

Utopian Transmissions

Oh girl, look.

Techno-Feminist Utopia brings you regular feminist documentary (once every month), with visually-inspired speculation that draws its influences from drag culture, queer theory, Continental philosophy, political activism, radical feminism, and visual & performing art (Alexandria Brown is a painter, Gianna Love does dance and performance art).
We are currently working on our next episode, which we are thinking will be about religion. How do spiritual beliefs affect social structures like the nuclear family? How does religious belief affect a woman’s relationship to beauty? Cosmetic surgery? Can polytheism offer alternatives? Matriarchal religion? Is there such a thing as feminist monotheism with a Male god-figure? How can we reinterpret mythologies productively and affirmatively rather than simply rejecting them? It will ...

Oh girl, look.

By aletheia_shortwave • 13 years ago

TECHNO-FEMINIST UTOPIA: New Youtube TV Series!

Happy Cinco de Mayo, Feministing community!

I am writing to let you know about a new Youtube TV series I have co-authored with my friend, Gianna Love, called “Techno-Feminist Utopia.” We will be regularly updating with episodes spanning the gamut of issues in feminism which interest us. Note: some content may be graphic and/or triggering.

In our first episode, Gianna and I discuss whether the pressure which male-to-female transsexuals face to “pass” as hyperfeminine women can cause them to idealize an identity (as housewife or sex kitten) which is psychologically oppressive, and sometimes physically unhealthy or life-threatening — the same way many women do.

Next week we will be meeting with Gianna’s trans-mother, Ms. Apple Love, who has been doing drag performances since ...

Happy Cinco de Mayo, Feministing community!

By aletheia_shortwave • 14 years ago

The Question of “Gendercide” and Sex-Selective Abortion

This piece is in response to a post on Princess Masako and the value societies globally place on sons over daughters, written by Anushay Hossain. I am writing because I see the debate becoming much more polarized than is necessary or productive. I’ve thought a lot more about this issue from the angle of political philosophy, and feel I have a new viewpoint to contribute to the situation. I think if we have a calm dialogue about the issue we can recognize that “gendercide” can “happen” without any specific individual intending for it to happen. I also believe that the simple fact that a woman “chooses” to have an abortion, if she is choosing out of fear or desperation, does ...

By aletheia_shortwave • 14 years ago

Anti-Choice Group Compares Abortion To Genocide

Trigger warning.

I have posted once before about a monopolization of public space on my campus by sexist and patriarchal forces, but this situation takes the cake. I walked up to my classroom building on Tuesday to see a fire truck, an ambulance, a police car, and a giant sign that said “GENOCIDE.” After quickly realizing I was not in any immediate danger and letting my heartbeat slow down, I realized what I was witnessing was a massive anti-choice display. And by ‘massive’ I mean — 20-foot tall images of aborted fetuses, lynched people of color, and Holocaust victims. Nazi symbols next to pictures of Barack Obama. This stuff makes the sex-crazed preacher who was here in January look like Gloria ...

Trigger warning.

By aletheia_shortwave • 14 years ago

Queer Theory Course Lambasted by Florida “Family” Association

No, we won’t offer a drag show. Shoutout to Dr. Crawley.

I’m taking the grad-level version of this course… and it’s great. And really quite rigorous. And yet, Dr. Crawley has had to arrange for the dean of students to stand outside the classroom to prevent people from harassing students or even posing as students in order to inflitrate the undergrad-level class and proselytize, because the Florida “Family” Association has been spreading rumors that the class is a cover for a semester-long drag show featuring a drag king who dresses like Eminem?

The Tampa Bay Times ran an article about the controversy next to an article about “a chicken with two vajayjays.” I could go on, but I think Sun Sentinel ...

No, we won’t offer a drag show. Shoutout to Dr. Crawley.

I’m taking the grad-level version of this course… and it’s great. And really quite rigorous. And yet, Dr. Crawley has had to arrange for the dean ...

By aletheia_shortwave • 14 years ago

Police Support of Public Sexual Harassment on a College Campus

I am attending classes at USF in Tampa, Florida, right now. In addition to the Florida Family Association‘s attempt to shut down the Queer Theory course I am taking by harassing the administration, protesting outside the classroom, and attempting to infiltrate the class (our professor had to take a special roll call to ensure representatives of the FFA were not sitting in posing as students in order to disrupt debate), we also have to deal with this man below. He is on campus every day and has been for the past two years. Since being punched in the face after insulting people of color and calling someone’s girlfriend a whore, he sued the school, which has had the strange ...

By aletheia_shortwave • 14 years ago

Huge, Gigantic, Disgusting Gender Fail at The Onion

DISCLAIMER: Because I have been accused of this in the past whenever I engage in critique of misogynistic media, no, I do not think that media like this, or porn, or whatever, should be censored or criminalized. I do think we should work as actively as possible to create the same general atmosphere surrounding this type of media as we can usually find in response to a generally equivalent piece of media on the topic of race.
I am not sure how exactly to best vandalize the Onion with physical graffiti, but their newest video, entitled “VH1 Reality Show Bus Crashes in California Causing Major Slut Spill” is really hands-down the most dehumanizing and misogynistic piece of satire I have ...