The Games We Play: Why Going To The Park Gets Ruined By Street Harassment
Ever since I moved to New York two years ago, I’ve been overwhelmed by the experience. Normally when I’m overwhelmed, I’d spend time reading and writing outside. But even that becomes overwhelming in New York because actually getting to an outside that’s not concrete is a twenty-minute trip. The outdoor experience isn’t as good, either. I used to have a nice yard with a tree to lie under. Now I have to share that tree with at least two or three people, one of whom will inevitably be on a cell phone talking loudly about something…
Trayvon Martin? Not On My Watch
SANFORD, Fla. — Saturday July 13, 2013, George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer who fatally shot Trayvon Martin, an unarmed black teenager, was found not guilty of second-degree murder and was acquitted of a lesser charge of manslaughter. You will hear details of the news story from sources everywhere in the coming weeks – or so I hope. What I want to focus on now is the conversation this has started and what we can do so it never, ever happens again. I saw news of the verdict for the first time through…
France Becomes 14th Country to Legalize Marriage Equality!
Félicitations to France for becoming the 14th nation to offer full and equal marriage rights! On Tuesday April 23, less than a week after New Zealand’s declaration, France’s senate passed a marriage equality bill into law with a vote of 331-225. The National Assembly originally supported the bill 329-229 and the Senate passed it with a voice vote. French lovers are happy to note that the law will be effect in just a few months, marking France as the 14th country to legalize marriage equality. In fact, this has been an unprecedented month…
New Zealand Passes Same-Sex Marriage Into Law
Yesterday, Wednesday Apr 17, 2013, New Zealand parliament passed a law legalizing same-sex marriage. The “Definition of Marriage Amendment Bill” was passed into Law by 77 votes to 44 on it’s third reading. The formal announcement of the vote was followed by a “waiata”, a traditional Māori song. The waiata that seemed to spontaneously erupt and spread through the crowd, including quite a few lawmakers, was a love song called “Pokarekare Ana.” This was a beautiful and appropriate way of marking such a historic moment, and was also a helpful reminder to…
Why Do We Accept Skewed Gender Portrayals in Media?
I recently came across an interesting article in HuffPost Books while scrolling through my twitter feed. Laura Santoro, Writer and Former Foreign Correspondent for HuffPost, explores an underlying reality in fiction; that female characters are more limited than their male counterparts. She writes: I came to a Child of God by Cormac McCarthy late in life — so late that I remember going to a dinner party and loudly objecting to the protagonist, Lester Ballard, dragging the frozen corpse of a woman he’d murdered from the attic and waiting for it…
