What I'm Reading?
Jun. 14th, 2023 08:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. What I'm reading...
Burn it Down: Power Complicity and a Call to Change in Hollywood by Maureen Ryan
Slowly making it through the audio book. It's dense. And informative. She goes into depth on the meritocracy in Hollywood - and how opportunities are slanted towards those with inside contacts or parents in the business. And are often, or overwhelmingly "white" and "male". HBO - she states has few if any female show-runners. And the acquisition of Discovery furthers the predominant stance of not pissing off Middle-America.
Having made it through the Lost chapter, and the chapter on demographics (largely white), I'm on the Sleepy Hollow chapter - right now all is well, in the world. It's the first season of Sleepy Hollow. When for the first time - a black female was leading a network horror series (its usually white men). But of course that went to hell rather quickly, didn't it?
I'm curious to see how, I know what happened (I was watching it - and gave up on it for well the same reasons everyone else did), and why (racism and white male power trip - hello), but not exactly the hows and wherefores and whos.
It's enlightening book - because it depicts the systematic racism and sexism in this industry and how debilitating it is to all involved, along with the viewers.
Lost could have been an amazing, ground-breaking series - but instead it fell down the rabbit hole of old white male power tropes...and cliched stereotypes, so will most likely fade away with time, if it hasn't already.
I don't know, however how much of this was racism, and how much was a kind of self-serving white male power trip? They do go hand in hand.
Racism is kind of insidious in our culture, a virus that I'd say infects us all in varying degrees of infection. I don't go a day without seeing traces of it, or rather symptoms in myself and those around me. I never really have. Nor, I suspect have any of you or anyone really. I'd say it's a plague on our culture - and far worse than COVID, which only in stark contrast infects a few. It's also a killer. It destroys jobs. Workplaces.
Everything really. And I honestly don't know how to combat it in others let alone myself - except by acknowledging it, calling it out, and not handwaving it when it occurs - also not penalizing or shaming, but questioning and attempting to change perspectives. You can't change someone's mind by shaming them or punishing them - but you can do it, by showing, and appealing to their better nature or at least trying to, and by listening. Or so I've discovered. It doesn't always work - but it's all I know.
Today at work, a colleague who'd I'd not spoken to in about five-six years, called to pick my brain in regards to contractors for a job. During our lengthy chat about crazy workplaces, and bad managers, he mentioned that he'd been brought up on a race claim - which he fought. Now, he is a Trump Supporter (I know that) and he said off-color remarks about Obama (but this is true of half the floor). He doesn't to my knowledge have any power. So he can't really discriminate. He can make racist remarks - which can make people uncomfortable - but I've not heard them. But I also didn't discuss politics with him, or anything in which it would have come up.
When he told me about it? I just listened. I don't know who it was - nor do I want to know. But it got me to thinking how prevalent this is. And how I can't escape it, no matter where I go. It's like a cancer. And I don't think we can cure it. It hurts us all - just to varying degrees - much like cancer does.
The Witch King by Martha Wells
It's interesting. I'm not that far into it. But far enough to have figured out the protagonist is a demon in mortal form, and this is a fantasy novel that takes place in another world. There's a lot of world-building but we get fed it slowly, not all at once. Kind of similar to how she did the world building in "The Murderbot Diaries: All Systems Red. Except this is a novel (400 pages) as opposed to a series of novellas.
Wells likes anti-hero characters or characters that are typically viewed in this manner, and subverting the trope. We are in their point of view - and through them are shown that they aren't evil, nothing close. Misunderstood, maybe. But they are also not woobiefied or victimized. They are just the lead character and hero from their perspective.
In Murderbot - it was well murderous robot who became sentient and decided to rebel against its programming. In the Witch King - it's a rebellious demon who decides to go a different path than well the traditional proscribed one of getting married and breeding demonic children with mortals and/or demons. (At least that appears to be the gist at the moment, I could be wrong about this.)
At any rate, both go against their programming, and there are consequences good and bad for both.
Yesterday I struggled more with it - because Ugh, brain fog. But today not as big a deal - and it went better.
Struggling with a reading slump - so I hope this breaks it.
2. Good news, I now have proof that Squidgeworld unlike Ao3 is thrilled to be getting movie reviews and meta. And has no issues with it. Their administrator (squidgie) thanked me for posting a review of the Film Stranger than Fiction, while Ao3 told me to delete film reviews or face the consequences.
I'm beginning to respect SquidgeWorld more - it's rules make sense. It is against AI, anything racist or exploitative of children or bigoted, and don't be a dick. A03 on the other hand appears to be fine with AI, racist, exploitative of kids, bigoted content, and dickish behavior. It just doesn't want film reviews, episode recaps, and meta it doesn't think is transformative? Basically it appears to be more worried about copyright law than common decency? IDK.
So...there you have it?
At any rate I'm currently on https://www.squidgeworld.org/ as shadowkat, and wordpress blog is outriderchronicles, link is in my profile page, I think. That's where I'm posting all this content that I'm removing from A03 per A03's request. (I'm afraid they will delete my account on me.)
Burn it Down: Power Complicity and a Call to Change in Hollywood by Maureen Ryan
Slowly making it through the audio book. It's dense. And informative. She goes into depth on the meritocracy in Hollywood - and how opportunities are slanted towards those with inside contacts or parents in the business. And are often, or overwhelmingly "white" and "male". HBO - she states has few if any female show-runners. And the acquisition of Discovery furthers the predominant stance of not pissing off Middle-America.
Having made it through the Lost chapter, and the chapter on demographics (largely white), I'm on the Sleepy Hollow chapter - right now all is well, in the world. It's the first season of Sleepy Hollow. When for the first time - a black female was leading a network horror series (its usually white men). But of course that went to hell rather quickly, didn't it?
I'm curious to see how, I know what happened (I was watching it - and gave up on it for well the same reasons everyone else did), and why (racism and white male power trip - hello), but not exactly the hows and wherefores and whos.
It's enlightening book - because it depicts the systematic racism and sexism in this industry and how debilitating it is to all involved, along with the viewers.
Lost could have been an amazing, ground-breaking series - but instead it fell down the rabbit hole of old white male power tropes...and cliched stereotypes, so will most likely fade away with time, if it hasn't already.
I don't know, however how much of this was racism, and how much was a kind of self-serving white male power trip? They do go hand in hand.
Racism is kind of insidious in our culture, a virus that I'd say infects us all in varying degrees of infection. I don't go a day without seeing traces of it, or rather symptoms in myself and those around me. I never really have. Nor, I suspect have any of you or anyone really. I'd say it's a plague on our culture - and far worse than COVID, which only in stark contrast infects a few. It's also a killer. It destroys jobs. Workplaces.
Everything really. And I honestly don't know how to combat it in others let alone myself - except by acknowledging it, calling it out, and not handwaving it when it occurs - also not penalizing or shaming, but questioning and attempting to change perspectives. You can't change someone's mind by shaming them or punishing them - but you can do it, by showing, and appealing to their better nature or at least trying to, and by listening. Or so I've discovered. It doesn't always work - but it's all I know.
Today at work, a colleague who'd I'd not spoken to in about five-six years, called to pick my brain in regards to contractors for a job. During our lengthy chat about crazy workplaces, and bad managers, he mentioned that he'd been brought up on a race claim - which he fought. Now, he is a Trump Supporter (I know that) and he said off-color remarks about Obama (but this is true of half the floor). He doesn't to my knowledge have any power. So he can't really discriminate. He can make racist remarks - which can make people uncomfortable - but I've not heard them. But I also didn't discuss politics with him, or anything in which it would have come up.
When he told me about it? I just listened. I don't know who it was - nor do I want to know. But it got me to thinking how prevalent this is. And how I can't escape it, no matter where I go. It's like a cancer. And I don't think we can cure it. It hurts us all - just to varying degrees - much like cancer does.
The Witch King by Martha Wells
It's interesting. I'm not that far into it. But far enough to have figured out the protagonist is a demon in mortal form, and this is a fantasy novel that takes place in another world. There's a lot of world-building but we get fed it slowly, not all at once. Kind of similar to how she did the world building in "The Murderbot Diaries: All Systems Red. Except this is a novel (400 pages) as opposed to a series of novellas.
Wells likes anti-hero characters or characters that are typically viewed in this manner, and subverting the trope. We are in their point of view - and through them are shown that they aren't evil, nothing close. Misunderstood, maybe. But they are also not woobiefied or victimized. They are just the lead character and hero from their perspective.
In Murderbot - it was well murderous robot who became sentient and decided to rebel against its programming. In the Witch King - it's a rebellious demon who decides to go a different path than well the traditional proscribed one of getting married and breeding demonic children with mortals and/or demons. (At least that appears to be the gist at the moment, I could be wrong about this.)
At any rate, both go against their programming, and there are consequences good and bad for both.
Yesterday I struggled more with it - because Ugh, brain fog. But today not as big a deal - and it went better.
Struggling with a reading slump - so I hope this breaks it.
2. Good news, I now have proof that Squidgeworld unlike Ao3 is thrilled to be getting movie reviews and meta. And has no issues with it. Their administrator (squidgie) thanked me for posting a review of the Film Stranger than Fiction, while Ao3 told me to delete film reviews or face the consequences.
I'm beginning to respect SquidgeWorld more - it's rules make sense. It is against AI, anything racist or exploitative of children or bigoted, and don't be a dick. A03 on the other hand appears to be fine with AI, racist, exploitative of kids, bigoted content, and dickish behavior. It just doesn't want film reviews, episode recaps, and meta it doesn't think is transformative? Basically it appears to be more worried about copyright law than common decency? IDK.
So...there you have it?
At any rate I'm currently on https://www.squidgeworld.org/ as shadowkat, and wordpress blog is outriderchronicles, link is in my profile page, I think. That's where I'm posting all this content that I'm removing from A03 per A03's request. (I'm afraid they will delete my account on me.)