Some links I love this week (because I cannot write without looking up stuff):1. Women on the front lines - Far from being solely passive witnesses to--or victims of--the fighting in World War II, women were on the front lines from day one.
2. World's Sexiest Accents - Where "the come-hither condescension and fiery disinterest of the French tongue remains paradoxically erotic." Holding down the number one spot are the Italians (Please see: Appolonia, my favorite Italian). I have nothing against the Italians (I do have a not-so-secret dream of visiting their country just for the food) but really, we're not holding Louis Garrel above Alex Del Piero?
3. Patricia Evangelista's op-ed, In Defense of Blasphemy - Welcome to the Philippine Inquisition! While I do not appreciate Poleteismo (the infamous conceptual art series by Mideo Cruz), I greatly disapprove of any attempt to curb freedom of expression.
There are so many spot-on statements in this article, some of my favorites:
"Poleteismo” is “the product of a troubled mind,” says Commission on Human Rights Chair Etta Rosales, whose sudden mastery of pop psychology has neglected the fact many of the communists and journalists killed under her watch were also silenced for speaking sacrilege against their killers. The guardians of morality are now a motley crew that includes the son of one of the country’s most cherished sex symbols, a former military chief whose martial law regime was a time of lies and terror, and a television host who was accused by an underaged starlet named Pepsi Paloma of coercing her to drop a rape case against several of his comedy co-hosts. Paloma committed suicide in 1985. Tito Sotto is now a senator of the republic."
"This is what the moralists forget when they demand limits on free speech—that the right to free expression is not limited to speech that agrees with Imelda Marcos’ good and true and beautiful.
The threat of the existence of another religion has historically been enough to cause the same vicious frenzy that has spattered Cruz’s Facebook page with anonymous messages threatening hell and damnation. The only difference is that today there is a government and a Constitution built to protect people who disagree, troubled or not, from being crucified for rebellion at the instigation of a maddened mob.
The issue is not good art or bad art or what the Inquirer editorial dismisses as “unoriginal art.” The issue is freedom. When the Church stamped its indignant foot, the floor cracked under the country’s bastion of free expression"
For further reading, please also see The Crucible of Free Speech.4. The flight from marriage at The Economist - Asians are marrying later, and less, than in the past. This has profound implications for women, traditional family life and Asian politics. From this article, we learn that two forces are giving Asian women more autonomy: education and jobs. Education changes women’s expectations and the rates of non-marriage rise at every stage of education. Better education also makes possible the other main trend changing marriage: female employment. Asia’s economic miracle has caused—and been caused by—a surge of women into the formal workforce.
5. Propaganda posters:
Calling All Comrades! - Long-lost propaganda posters that rallied the Soviets against the Nazis. During the early days of the invasion, as the German advance was making rapid progress, artists and writers gathered in Moscow under the banner of the TASS News Agency to look for a way to boost the rapidly sagging Soviet morale. Their solution was to produce massive posters that vilified the Nazis and lauded the Soviet resistance while commenting on the news of the war effort. Particularly notable for being produced under the totalitarian regime of Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, their efforts stand out as some of the most striking works of art from World War II.
Charmain Mao's Technicolor Dream World - Communist China viewed through decades of propaganda posters was a uniformly cheerful and confident nation -- though the smiling, apple-cheeked faces and bucolic peasant scenes hide the bitter realities of life under Mao's regime. I have an awful urge of framing Tempering Red Hearts in Stormy Waves but I will get over that, I hope.
6. Figuring out first dates, because... well, just because. I don't really do well on dates, in general, but I have picked up quite a few tips (none from the article but some from people I look up to) that I can try on the next one (if God, and His fantastic sense of irony, decides to give me another one). The first being, "There is nothing wrong with me.", in which I will project confidence even if my insecurities are killing me on the inside. #darkandtwisty
7. From Me To You - A tumblr I live vicariously through. This is one of my favorite personal sites and Jamie, the one who runs the blog, is just as beautiful as the clothes she wears and the pictures she takes. My favorite posts: At home with (she visits New Yorkers in their very special apartments, and who wouldn't love that? I love looking at well-decorated small spaces, it takes serious will power to tear myself off apartmenttherapy.com), Paris Cafes (Black-and-white pictures of Parisian cafes shot on film) and A Swingin' Summer (Ain't no summer like a summer in the City!)
Also, movies I watched this week: A Little Romance (featuring a young Diane Lane, I really liked this film. It reminded me of Flipped), Friends with Benefits (Movies like this I can sit through because a.) it's set in New York and b.) The little genius Nolah Gould is in it), Crazy, Stupid, Love (Most of the people in this movie are my favorites but sadly, I was underwhelmed) and Monte Carlo (I don't know what got into me. Oh, I know. Wanderlust. And Leighton Meester's clothes.) Clearly, I have excellent taste when it comes to these things. Not.
AND NOT TO MISS! Frank O'Hara reading Having a Coke With You in his flat in New York before his death in 1966. I never got into poetry but I do love a few poems, like this one. (
I look
at you and I would rather look at you than all the portraits in the world, come on. What's not to love?)
"it is hard to believe when I’m with you that there can be anything as still
as solemn as unpleasantly definitive as statuary when right in front of it
in the warm New York 4 o’clock light we are drifting back and forth
between each other like a tree breathing through its spectacles
and the portrait show seems to have no faces in it at all, just paint
you suddenly wonder why in the world anyone ever did them"
♥
