Pan's quotation journal [entries|friends|calendar] telling a story with other people's words [ userinfo | livejournal userinfo ] [ calendar | livejournal calendar ]

[30 Jan 2010|09:30pm] Despite the hardships and inequities my parents endured as Blacks, they were never bitter. It never occured to either of my parents to feel inferior to anyone for any reason. My father taught us, "You are not better than anyone else. But there is no one better than you." Both my parents -- and in my father's case, his parents as well -- had defied the odds and bucked the system. They saw no reason why we could not become whatever we wanted. - Nichelle Nichols, Beyond Uhura (pg 27-28) and there's someone listening

[24 Jan 2010|05:52pm] The show was doing what Americans always do when it comes to race and reality. We discuss race like second graders. We can't mix reality and race together. Race and reality are like vampires and werewolves. The two can never mingle. Except in that movie Underworld where they totally did mix, but then they created some sort of uber monster that was bigger and stronger than anything else. And ironically enough, that's exactly what would happen if race and reality mixed. It would create this uber monster called knowledgeable people. Scary! - Elon James White, TWIB Season 3 - Ep#4 and there's someone listening

[04 Jan 2010|10:46pm] "I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented." - Elie Wiesel in his Nobel Acceptance Speech, December 10, 1986 and there's someone listening

[03 Jan 2010|03:28am] You say the reason things fall to the ground is because of gravity. I say that gravity is a word, a name you gave to a small aspect of the magic that surrounds you on a daily basis. Electricity is another name for magic. Wind is another name for magic. Water is another name for magic. Love is another name for magic. We all live in a magical place. - this post on I Wrote This For You and there's someone listening

[28 Dec 2009|12:39am] I just wish more people handled racism and sexism, like they do *everything else*. You wouldn't argue with a person who lost their mother to cancer about your right to make cancer jokes around them, would you? You wouldn't blame them for being "too sensitive" if they told you they were offended by them, would you? You wouldn't try to invalidate their hurt by referencing others who did find it funny would you? No, because that would make you a dick. But for some strange reason people do that kind stuff *all the time* for race and sex. I just don't understand. - cleojones in this comment and there's someone listening

[13 Dec 2009|09:49pm] Fans everywhere appreciated the fact that Kelley had carried The Search for Spock, much as McCoy had carried Spock's soul. They recognized the passage of time and the preciousness of what they had in Kelley. To make sure he knew how they felt, the convention known as SpaceTrek presented him with an honorary Academy Award -- by unanimous decision, of course. During a standing ovation, he was presented a trophy by Kathe Walker and her committee. The fans' love was returned without reservation. Their love for him was not a fiction, and his response was genuine. He belonged to them as much as he could belong to anything. Through all the decades of struggle in Hollywood, a victim of circumstance and timing, from star to character actor to typecast television star and a ghost, the industry had never given him so much as a nod. These people appreciated what he had done. They listened to him, and they remembered. They saw what he was trying to do with the role they had made last nearly twenty years. He held their golden statuette, and when he could speak, he strongly said, to them and to the entertainment industry as a whole, "I'd rather have it from you." - from page 260 of From Sawdust to Stardust: The Biography of DeForest Kelley by Terry Lee Rioux and there's someone listening

[12 Dec 2009|09:51pm] Dear ontd_startrek (and countless other communities everywhere), It is not okay to call a woman a whore because: a) You do not agree with said woman's dress b) You do not enjoy said woman's television show c) You do not feel said woman gives off the right impression d) You do not, for any reason, respect said woman e) You are butthurt because said woman is now dating a famous A-lister f) IT JUST ISN'T. Look. This is two-fold bad, okay? One, you are sexualising a woman based on her wearing skimpy clothing. You are, in fact, saying "this woman chooses to wear a certain type of clothing and this makes her up for sex". What you are doing by saying this is scaffolding the many, many layers of social culture that not only justify rape, but blame women for it. You are literally feeding right into the blame culture. You are part of the pitiful rape conviction statistics. Yes. Just because you used one word. When women use this term, they justify men using it. They justify other people using it. They justify the fact that it is considered acceptable for a man to sexually assault a woman if certain conditions are met. THIS IS NOT OKAY. These are not just words. These are attitudes that contribute to a culture and a culture which directly impacts upon crime statistics and female safety. It is that serious. Equally, what you are doing by using the word 'whore' is that you are degrading female sexuality. "Euw, that woman looks like she is a sexual being / might enjoy having sex - I know, I'll call her a prostitute". Whatever your feelings on prostitution (that's a whole other argument), all this boils down to is women restricting female sexuality. We remain uncomfortable with it. Society would like us not to have it - unless, of course, it's for the purpose of titillating men. A woman feeling sexually confident for her own sake? Seems to scare the bejesus out of people. Such that a woman who wears sexy clothing or who is in touch with her sexuality or, scandalously, enjoys her breasts or sits on the knee of a grown man - well, she deserves to be shunned. Ladies don't behave like that, right? The irony is that when Zoe Saldana talks about female savagery and not being prepared to change who she is because society has yet to accept certain female behaviours - fandom applaud that. I applaud that; I think it's brave and I think we all need to listen to it. Only it's acceptable from her because she's seen as a lady. She's seen as classy. Ladylike. So it's fine. If a woman chooses to be less than this, chooses to wear scanty clothing, chooses to prominently display her breasts - this whole idea of acceptance goes out the window. It's a step too far. We will only accept certain behaviour in women. Anything deemed slutty is ostracised. It's only okay for 'beautiful' women to be admired exactly as they are. Everybody else is fair game. We have to stop judging. Seriously. Women are not going to get anywhere when we treat each other like shit because of some arbitrary ideas about how we're supposed to behave. I wish we could all say fuck the rules - not just because an acceptable female celebrity tells us to, because that's easy. But because we were at a point where judging female behaviour makes us as oppressive as those who oppressed us. We do not need to be judged anymore. We can do anything that we want to. So stop it. Stop with the conditions. Stop with the rules about when we can accept a woman for what she is, and when we can't. Nobody is saying that you have to like Olivia Munn. Nobody is saying that you have to worship the ground that she walks on. I'll even understand the people who are a bit sad that their crush object has found somebody else to be with - it's not my world, but that's fine. Just, for the love of God, stop degrading her for being with him. Stop degrading her, period. Just sit for one damn second and think about the ramifications of what you're saying about a woman you do not know, based on a photograph, a news clip or a stereotypical thought. Based on the idea that she is a woman who is not worthy of a man. Because nothing says 'classy' like berating a woman you don't know based on archaic sexist ideas. No love, wrangler. - wrangler in a locked post in her journal (quoted with permission) [context = negative comments in ontd_startrek about Olivia Munn after it was discovered she was dating Chris Pine] and there's someone listening

[05 Dec 2009|08:10pm] "[That's] the whole point of what I do -- the monster ball, the music, the performance art aspect of it. I want to create a space for my fans where they can feel free and celebrate because I didn't fit in in high school and I felt like a freak. So I like to create this atmosphere for my fans where they feel like they have a freak in me to hang with and they don't feel alone." - Lady Gaga (on the Ellen Degeneres Show, November 27th, 2009) and there's someone listening

[18 Nov 2009|03:29am] "Any time there is a fat person onstage as anything besides the butt of a joke, it's political. Add physical movement, then dance, then sexuality and you have a revolutionary act." - Heather MacAllister (as originally heard through the memorial on Big Burlesque) and there's someone listening

[30 Oct 2009|01:28am] "You treat her like a lady, and she'll always bring you home." - Dr. Leonard McCoy, "Encounter At Farpoint" (TNG 1x01) [1] and there's someone listening

[22 Oct 2009|04:13am] "There are many parts of my youth I'm not proud of. There were loose threads -- untidy parts of me that I would like to remove. But when I pulled on one of those threads, it unraveled the tapestry of my life." - Jean-Luc Picard Picard, "Tapestry" (TNG 6x15) and there's someone listening

[18 Oct 2009|05:05am] "...things always work out in the end. Because if they haven't worked out, then it's not the end." - starandrea in this entry [1] and there's someone listening

[17 Oct 2009|02:37am] "Always make new mistakes." - Ester Dyson and there's someone listening

[08 Oct 2009|01:28am] "Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could." - Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum (heard via Rin who heard it via Amanda Fucking Palmer) and there's someone listening

[04 Oct 2009|01:18am] "The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up." - Mark Twain and there's someone listening

[25 Sep 2009|04:03pm] "I make the living, but she makes the living worthwhile." - DeForest Kelley about his wife Carolyn and there's someone listening

[23 Sep 2009|04:33am] "The greatest expression of rebellion is joy." - Joss Whedon, Dr. Horrible acceptance speech (Creative Arts) at the 2009 Emmys and there's someone listening

[04 Sep 2009|04:52pm] We're all bigger than we are. We're all pieces of the universe talking to itself, trying to figure itself out. Why would one kind of awareness be more valid than another? This is why I change my answer to "do you believe in god" depending on whom I'm speaking with. I try to address the intent of the question. If the intent is, "do you feel an awareness outside of your own that affects your day-to-day actions?" then the answer is yes. (The awareness is the same as mine, I'm just more and less aware of things outside myself at any given time, often leading to a feeling of separateness.) If the intent is, "do you think there is an individual all-powerful entity in control of your life?" then the answer is no. Sometimes I try to explain that I'm sure there are beings in the universe who have what we might consider god-like powers, but I think they have better things to do than manipulate us. I mean, unless we're in their terrarium or something. Other times I explain that I'm sure everything has a spirit, an awareness as valid as our own, just differently expressed. This includes inorganic and artificial things, since we're all made of the same stuff and I don't see why one combination of energy is more aware than another. - starandrea in this post and there's someone listening

[04 Sep 2009|04:51pm] "In a lot of cases, what you find out is that you don't know whether something is good or bad until many generations have gone by. History, who's the good guy and who's the bad guy, who's responsible and... who started it, that's the question. Who started it? It depends on where you start the story... It's the great sweep of time that allows us to make sense of our lives and the lives of people." - Mary Doria Russell, Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett: the Novelist as God (heard via starandrea) and there's someone listening

[04 Sep 2009|04:50pm] "My brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, to be remembered simply as a good decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. Those of us who loved him and who take him to his rest today pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others will someday come to pass for all the world. As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him: 'Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.'" - Ted Kennedy, of Bobby Kennedy in 1968 (heard via starandrea) and there's someone listening

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