sitting-up mud


so maybe I have a little headache
maybe I was born with a little headache


Cause, meet Effect

ILU Dave Holmes

myyearofeverything:

I’ve just finished the part of “The Unlikely Disciple” where author Kevin Roose reaches his limit of the rampant homophobia* at Liberty University, and I’m right there with him. While the general attitude toward gays seems to be “bemused pity,” some students just actively do not like gay people (never having met one, naturally). But statistically speaking, there have to be some gay kids at Liberty. Roose has a talk with the campus spiritual adviser whose job is ministry to students “suffering unwanted same-sex attraction,” which is a pretty brave move. These kids can’t drink, swear or watch R-rated movies, so you have to imagine the gossip machine is well-oiled.

Ministry-To-Gays guy serves up a “hate the sin, love the sinner” platter that’s discouraging, but could certainly be worse. It does, though, contain the one exasperating element that I’m ready to stop coming across: “We just want to keep people away from the gay lifestyle because it is one of substance abuse and promiscuous, anonymous sex, and is therefore unhealthy.”

Anytime I hear this argument, I’m reminded of swim meets.

Read the rest

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Looking back, I found any number of films in which some of the most celebrated heroes of movie history behave badly enough to risk inviting serious scrutiny, if not downright condemnation, from the love police. Here are just a dozen. Can you think of others?
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Edward Cullen, stalker? Yes, but so is the hero of ‘The Graduate’ | EW.com

YES I CAN, OWEN GLEIBERMAN. I CAN THINK OF ROUGHLY ONE BILLION OTHERS. DO YOU KNOW WHY OKAY I’LL TELL YOU IT’S BECAUSE OF PARADIGMS, OWEN! GENDER, OWEN! SEX, OWEN! HERE LET ME REGISTER YOU FOR SOMETHING IT’S CALLED FEMINISM 101 IN THIS CLASS WE’LL LEARN ABOUT HOW EVERYTHING HAS PRETTY MUCH SUCKED FOR ALL TIME WHEN IT COMES TO CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS OF WOMEN IN RELATIONSHIPS!!!! OKAY CAN’T WAIT TO READ YOUR FINAL PAPER!!!! YES GONE WITH THE WIND CERTAINLY DOES PUSH BOUNDARIES WITH OUR HEARTS!!!ANDMINDS!!!

IN A RELATED STORY, IF YOU FEAR THAT A YOUNG LADY IN YOUR LIFE WILL BE GIVEN A COPY OF TWILIGHT THIS CHRISTMAS, PERHAPS COUNTERACT THE EFFECTS BY PURCHASING HER A COPY OF THIS. OKAY. I’M GOING TO GO LIE DOWN NOW.

PS: “LOVE POLICE”????

(via meghanagain) (via kfan)

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Dave Eggers’ wonderful message on PRINT.

“Reports that no one reads anymore, especially young people, are greatly overstated and almost always factually lacking. I’ve written about youth readership elsewhere, but to reiterate: sales of young adult books are actually up. Total volume of all book sales is actually up. Kids get the same things out of books that they have before. Reading in elementary schools and middle schools is no different than any other time. We have work to do with keeping high schoolers reading, but then again, I meet every week with 15 high schoolers in San Francisco, and all we do is read (literary magazines, books, journals, websites, everything) in the process of putting together the Best American Nonrequired Reading. And I have to say these students, 14 to 18 years old, are far better read and more astute than I was at their age, and there are a million other kids around the country just like them.”

Click through and read it all…

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daveholmes: It takes a special kind of awful person to create a death rumor about a living person, but it’s unconscionable to go online and pretend a dead stranger is alive. Ken Ober died of a heart attack over the weekend, and as the news spread, various friends of his began to post about it on Twitter and Facebook. As many of these people are comedians with large followings, the news traveled far and wide before there was an official confirmation. A shameless nature abhors a vacuum. In the absence of an official news story confirming his death, someone decided to go online and call the whole thing a hoax. Someone thought: “Oh, hey- someone just died and there’s nothing online about it. I’ll make some people think their dead friend is alive.” And then they got online and did it. So as news traveled further and people took to the internet to confirm it, they were directed to this news story on the venerable news source “duniyalive.com.” (No sources, no quotes- just “he’s doing well,” from HOLLYWOOD.) Now, Ken and I were barely acquaintances. But he was a good man who was greatly loved by many, and a lot of those who loved him dealt with a lot of confusion and false hope this morning, just because someone wanted some traffic. That is fucking subhuman and inexcusable. Here’s an idea: the next time you want to post something hideous about someone- and I suggest we set the bar low here: anything you would not actually say to their face, or to the faces of their friends and family- stop for a moment, take a deep breath, and say the following three words: ACTUAL HUMAN BEING.

daveholmes:

It takes a special kind of awful person to create a death rumor about a living person, but it’s unconscionable to go online and pretend a dead stranger is alive.

Ken Ober died of a heart attack over the weekend, and as the news spread, various friends of his began to post about it on Twitter and Facebook. As many of these people are comedians with large followings, the news traveled far and wide before there was an official confirmation.

A shameless nature abhors a vacuum. In the absence of an official news story confirming his death, someone decided to go online and call the whole thing a hoax. Someone thought: “Oh, hey- someone just died and there’s nothing online about it. I’ll make some people think their dead friend is alive.” And then they got online and did it. So as news traveled further and people took to the internet to confirm it, they were directed to this news story on the venerable news source “duniyalive.com.” (No sources, no quotes- just “he’s doing well,” from HOLLYWOOD.)

Now, Ken and I were barely acquaintances. But he was a good man who was greatly loved by many, and a lot of those who loved him dealt with a lot of confusion and false hope this morning, just because someone wanted some traffic. That is fucking subhuman and inexcusable.

Here’s an idea: the next time you want to post something hideous about someone- and I suggest we set the bar low here: anything you would not actually say to their face, or to the faces of their friends and family- stop for a moment, take a deep breath, and say the following three words:

ACTUAL HUMAN BEING.

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puscic: ckck: Photographs by Jeff Bridges, on the set of Iron Man. Not only is Jeff Bridges one of my favourite actors, but he is an accomplished photographer as well. He’s been taking photographs on set of all of his films since the 80s, utilizing a curious wide-angle camera called the Widelux that produces these widescreen, cinematic frames, a perfect pairing for capturing the filmmaking process. At the end of every film, he collects the photographs he’s taken in a book that he then gives to the cast and crew as a memento of their time together. His personal website, which he has had for many years (long before it was cool for celebrities to have an internet presence with Twitter and the like), is a wonderful handmade piece of self-expression; a showcase for a great actor, photographer, musician and human being.

puscic:

ckck:

Photographs by Jeff Bridges, on the set of Iron Man.

Not only is Jeff Bridges one of my favourite actors, but he is an accomplished photographer as well. He’s been taking photographs on set of all of his films since the 80s, utilizing a curious wide-angle camera called the Widelux that produces these widescreen, cinematic frames, a perfect pairing for capturing the filmmaking process. At the end of every film, he collects the photographs he’s taken in a book that he then gives to the cast and crew as a memento of their time together.

His personal website, which he has had for many years (long before it was cool for celebrities to have an internet presence with Twitter and the like), is a wonderful handmade piece of self-expression; a showcase for a great actor, photographer, musician and human being.

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Dear Robert Smith (an open letter)

amandapalmer:

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“(audio cue: for those of you if you really ARE going to read this long fucking letter, I suggest you throw an old favorite record on for good measure. it might help. i suggest a cure record. or something sad. i’ll wait. ok, now read.)”

****

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Cleaning Out My Closet

I would like to click the little heart icon several times for this post.

myyearofeverything:

Clutter is a huge part of my life right now, as I’m still clearing out garages and storage spaces, still living out of boxes, still without a desk or a dresser, still not quite out of my old house. Moving is a great big pain in the ass, especially when you are an avid collector of things. Have you seen my thing collection? It is vast. Come look, and take some home with you. Please?

But it’s a mess of a different kind I’ve been thinking about throwing out lately. This week, I shot for a couple of days up in Boston. On my last day there I had a few hours to kill, so I rented a car and drove out to my alma mater Holy Cross. And, as befits the season, it was like visiting a haunted house. Ghosts leapt out from around every corner, and about 92% of them made me recoil in terror.*

I have a difficult relationship with the 18-22 year old version of me. You hear a lot about people finding themselves in college; I lost myself. I was the one music nerd in a college of sports fans, I was the kind Midwesterner among sarcastic New Englanders, I was the entire gay community, and all I wanted to do was fit in. I went in a happy, self-assured oddball, and about 5 minutes after my parents pulled away in the stationwagon, I looked around at the sea of soccer-playing J. Crew-clad brokers-to-be and said: “Better get to work turning myself into one of these people.” I honest to God don’t know where I went. Don’t misunderstand; I met some great people there. I just wish they’d met me.

read the whole thing

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