Huddle Up, Buttercups

May 30, 2020

We’re opening this week with a content warning for police brutality, fatal white supremacy, and murder. The fun stuff is below this section. Scroll down to the gif of [something cute & fun] if you need to.

Fellow Whites of Dames Nation, can we have a word?

As you probably know, things are a real mess right now. Once again, we here in the US of A are contending with a spate of highly visible, devastating, and fatal violence against our Black citizens, often perpetuated by officers of the law. That’s on top of the disproportionately high mortality rate of COVID-19 on our Black friends and neighbors. Most recently, George Floyd— a 46-year-old who, among other things, loved dancing poorly to make others laugh— died in police custody after Derek Chauvin, a Minneapolis police officer, kneeled on his windpipe for eight minutes, over Floyd’s dwindling vocal protest that he could not breathe.

Minneapolis residents have been protesting Mr. Floyd’s death and police brutality in their city, and Wednesday night, police officers shot at protestors with technically non-lethal rubber bullets and, as you might expect, that choice escalated the situation to the point that protestors began to retaliate physically. It got violent. People set fires and looted the Target downtown, and we can’t say we’re surprised or shocked that it got to that point.

The police hold a lot of power and ought to be operating, as fictional Sergeant Nicholas Angel puts it, with procedural correctness in the execution of unquestionable moral authority, but too often, and particularly in this case, they don’t. Too often police officers, a group uniquely authorized to make use of lethal force, are exactly the kind of people whose access to weapons any sensible person would elect to restrict. Notionally instructed to protect and serve, instead they bully, intimidate, and terrorize. And we’re supposed to be as upset about a Target, full of insured and replaceable consumer goods, getting looted as we are about the loss of George Floyd’s precious human life? No. We reject that false equivalence.

This violence is not new. This oppression is not novel. This cruelty is not innovative. It is endemic and foundational. It is as American as apple pie. The roots of white supremacy run deep, but we are going to keep scrabbling away at the dirt surrounding them until we die. We will not unearth it all, but we are going to uproot as much as we can.

Here’s how we’re scrabbling today, if you are called to join us:

Donate. If you have some money to spare, give to organizations like Reclaim the Block, Black Visions Collective, and North Star Health Collective. Reclaim The Block “organizes Minneapolis community and city council members to move money from the police department into other areas of the city’s budget that truly promote community health and safety.” Black Visions Collective “has been putting into practice the lessons learned from organizations before us in order to shape a political home for Black people across Minnesota.” North Star Health Collective works “in alliance with mainstream and anti-authoritarian organizations to create safe and healthy events.” You can also donate to your local bail fund or mutual aid society.
Educate yourself. Got two minutes? Great, you can read Ibram X. Kendi reminding us that “Police violence has historically been the source of the violent rebellions of Black people and their allies. Police violence begets violent resistance. If you want to end the violent resistance, then end the police violence.” The entire brief thread is well worth a read, and it pairs perfectly with Jay Smooth’s video— from 2014, yet tragically still pertinent— about riots as a direct and logical response to a state bent on destroying Black people.
Got five minutes? Wonderful, here’s Nikole Hannah-Jones on how, because non-violent protest was not working for Black activists, they began courting and inciting white violence as a long-term strategy during the Civil Rights era. Guess who didn’t learn about that strategic choice in high school US History classes? (It was us. We didn’t.)
And go on learning! Here’s a handy list of anti-racism resources including articles, podcasts, movies, books, and more. Libro.fm (an alternative to Audible for audiobooks, which benefits the independent bookstore of your choice) has prepared this handy list of books about anti-racism that you can read with your ears.
Teach your children (and nieces & nephews & grandkids & friends’ kids) well. Here’s a list in progress of books on race and anti-racism that can be shared with even the littlest bibliophiles. It is never too early to start talking about race with the children in your life. In fact, saying nothing is really dangerous and perpetuates whiteness as the desired default.
And for the love of Mike, don’t re-traumatize your Black friends by sharing images or auto-playing videos that display assaults on Black people. Don’t ask them to explain racism to you. Don’t expect them to perform graciousness and respectability when they’re rightly furious and grieving. Instead, think about quiet ways you can show up for them.
Finally, sit with your own discomfort and then do something about it. All of what we’ve written above is us renewing our pact with you and each other to do the same and to speak up and with our fellow whites— regularly, not just when there’s an uprising— about dismantling the white supremacy culture that we’ve been benefiting from all our lives. We’d love it if you joined us.

One piece of really sound, practical advice we have seen is this: make a list of ten things you can do when a problem arises in your neighborhood instead of calling the police. Find out which services in your community provide care and support— real service and protection— without the threat of state-sanctioned violence, and document how to reach them. Learn strategies for de-escalating conflict. Strengthen your bonds to the people around you so that you can solve issues collectively. There are a lot of options— give yourself the task of writing down ten and keep that list with you. It is small. But it is a place to start.

AS PROMISED, A CUTE GIF TO SIGNAL THAT ONLY FUN THINGS ARE BELOW THIS POINT IN THE NEWSLETTER

Genius droid BB-8 befriending a hedgehog is Peak Dames Shit

Dame Sophie’s Link Smorgasbord

Hello hypnotic punchbowl

I mentioned in the Wednesday night round-up of cute novelty t-shirts that I wished the A Film By Nora Ephron shirt would be re-stocked at Super Yaki, and guess what? It has been! It’s once again available for purchase as a ringer tee, a regular tee in black & desert rose, and a black crop top, yay! Since the desert rose colorway has turned out to be a little too peachy for me to wear without looking like a bowl of oatmeal, I have replaced it with a standard black tee and will be happy to send the peachy one to the first person who emails with a request to receive it. It’s size L, been worn once, and will be sent, freshly laundered, in a sealed ziploc within the mailing envelope so you can quarantine it as you see fit before wearing it. This is a worldwide offer! I will ship it literally anywhere! Don’t pay me, just make an affordable-for-you donation to one of the organizations suggested above or one of their ilk in your neck of the woods!
My champagne problem of the week was that the strawberries & rhubarb I got at the drive-through farmers’ market last weekend were not good. The strawberries had scarcely any flavor and the rhubarb was almost entirely green. Deb Perelman came to the rescue with her strawberry rhubarb soda syrup recipe and long story short, I now have nearly a quart of this ambrosial liquid in my fridge. No waste, lots of delicious summery flavor, and many months of cocktail & mocktail & sundae-festooning delights await!
What if Sufjan Stevens completed his life’s work by recording albums for every state? Special citation of excellence & hilarity for Nebraska, which functions as a second New Jersey, as all of the songs are references to songs from Bruce Springsteen’s spare & desolate album of the same name.

Dame Margaret’s Recalcitrant Brain is (Partially) Brought to Heel

With sufficient werewolf blood, even Michael Sheen can be a hunk.

I have been sitting on my front porch trying to motivate myself to write for, truly, three hours. And my brain has just been saying “SHAN’T.” Here is the compromise she and I have finally reached: I am going to share one link (a genuinely excellent one) and then a few choice music videos. My hope is that many of your brains, like mine, feel as though they have been run through the mangle by this past week and will be relived to receive only this much.

THE LINK: “A Feud in Wolf-Kink Erotica Raises Deep Legal Questions” by Alexandra Alter (with an embedded audio version produced by— you guessed it— me). When I saw this article assigned to me on Wednesday, I genuinely clapped my hands with glee. I had seen it pinging around the internet on Monday, but not settled in to read it and, truly, it was even better than I could have hoped. Go forth. Learn about copyright and wolf sex. Come away enriched.

THE SONGS: As I have detailed in this newsletter already (perhaps exhaustively), during Quar, I’ve been running music surveys every Sunday on my Instagram stories and creating crowd-sourced playlists out of the replies. Every one of my playlist children is my favorite, but I must own that this week’s prompt— name a song that you feel should either be more famous or more respected— produced a playlist that’s already been an incredible music discovery source for me.

It introduced me to “Tell Your Girlfriend” by Rebecca Levy, a song to which my neighbors have now been… quite overexposed. But JE NE REGRETTE RIEN! This song is perfect! I cannot reach its end without immediately skipping back to hear it from the beginning again. Join me in this perpetual emotion machine: