This Week's Writing 8/11/23

Barbie, antifascism, Afro-pessimist genre fiction...and maybe a little less posting?

I tried posting a little less this week, and managed to skip at least a day or two. It’s a work in progress…Eustacia is good at the luxurious relaxing, but I have more trouble with it (he says as he types htis at 3:15 AM because he has insomnia…) But let me know how you think it went if you’re so inclined!

Also, got a lot of new followers this week. Hi there! If you like my writing, consider becoming a paid subscriber. I try to keep most posts free, but to keep on keeping on, I do need money, alas. Capitalism is capitalisming, and the takes don’t write themselves.

Okay! Here’s what I wrote this week.

If you read one thing by me this week, read:

Don’t Worry, Darling and Barbie show that when women are denied desire, they lose the central place in their own narratives. (EIH)

Politics

Ohio’s Issue 1 shows how toxic GOP antiabortion politics have become. (Public Notice)

Trump attacks the women’s soccer team, and reminds everyone his is a politics of doom and hate. (Independent)

Antifascism is a positive good. (EIH)

Trump reminds the RNC that fascists don’t do primaries. (EIH)

Cultural Criticism

Stephen Kearse’s Liquid Snakes is a genre romp…and also a bleak Afro-pessimist parable. (LA Times)

The first Thor movie is an appealingly modest thunder god. (EIH)

The epic blackened death of…Psycroptic! (Chicago Reader)

Poetry

Algorithmic oulipo oddity. (dadakuku)

Vowel Tone

An eye, in or un,
grubs at rot’s end till
it runs where rats go.
Blot I and cut me
even to shut in all.

A brutal assessment of the state of poetry today. (Five Fleas)

There are two problems with poetry readings.
First, you have to listen to other people.
Second, they have to listen to you.

Little old school backyard poem. (Five Fleas)

Outside

The vine twines on the fence,
my eye twines round the vine.
Some buzzing thing goes twining
through the flowers and the vine.

Some part of me is twining,
like a bee among the vines.
The wind slides through the fence.
I think, and there's the vine.