I hope you are enjoying the outdoors as summer sadly fades to a close. I am doing so, usually with an ice cream in hand. Enjoy this week’s links.
“Blood is not thicker than freedom and it’s not thicker than safety. Sometimes blood is just that, blood.” In the wake of Charlottesville, Panama Jackson writes how “How Trump Ruined My Relationship with My White Mother. ”
Trump has just signed a memo prohibiting transgender people from joining the US military, so here is an article from earlier this summer showcasing the voices of Five Trans Service Members.
Robert Jago critiques how non-Indigenous media is focusing on the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario’s motion to remove Sir John A. Macdonald’s name from schools, and not on Macdonald’s living legacy: “There are 23 elementary schools in the Thunder Bay School district. While none of them are named after Sir John A. Macdonald, the school district remains one of the most dangerous in Canada for First Nations kids.”
Listen to this conversation on Indigenous families’ doubts about Canada’s inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.
Toronto has put up new street signs on major roads showing Indigenous translations of English names.
“Frankly, I don’t want my classes to be gladiatorial arenas where only the strongest survive. There’s already enough cruelty in the world…[Students] don’t need classrooms rooted in the arrogant belief that their experiences and contexts are meaningless, that the only Truth that matters is the one intoned by the unassailable, privileged authority at the front of the classroom.” Daniel Heath Justice disagrees with the caricatures of “student snowflakes”.
All Your Questions About Gender-Neutral Pronouns Answered!
Queer employees at a New York City sex toy store have voted to join the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, a milestone especially when considering that the retail sector in the United States remains mostly unorganized.
How do you find a good therapist?
Does prison abolition seem like a pipe dream? This article elaborates on how important abolitionists are, and have been: “Rather than juxtapose the fight for better conditions against the demand for eradicating institutions of state violence, abolitionists navigate this divide. For the better part of fifty years, abolitionists have led and participated in campaigns that have fought to reduce state violence and maximize people’s collective wellbeing.”
“Imagine replacing Gypsy as the show’s title with any other ethnic slur—the show would never have been made. And yet, Gypsy was made, riding on the back of the romantic popularization of the word in fashion, beauty, and social media.” Jessica Reidy on this racial slur and its use in a Netflix series.
An astute look at how popular Youtubers are capitalizing on self-care.
The Sex Workers Action Network is planning a red umbrella sticker initiative, similar to the rainbow flag sticker for the LGBTQ community, to identify safe spaces for sex workers. Agencies and stores with a red umbrella sticker will need to take sensitivity training.
An interview with Scaachi Koul on her memoir, One Day We’ll All be Dead and None of This Will Matter.
This is an article on Jerhonda Pace alleging sexual assault charges against R. Kelly, and how the music industry has turned a blind eye.
In America, Even With Affirmative Action, Blacks and Hispanics are More Underrepresented at Top Colleges Than 35 Years Ago.
Hana Shafi makes important affirmation art for distressing times:
Today’s affirmation art: May we have the strength to fight fascism! ??? I sure wish my fists had flowers tumbling down from them hahaha pic.twitter.com/pHy38o4y9V
— Frizz Kid (@HanaShafi) August 21, 2017
