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lastsonlost · 4 years

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Crossing the divide

Do men really have it easier? These transgender guys found the truth was more complex.

In the 1990s, the late Stanford neuroscientist Ben Barres transitioned from female to male. He was in his 40s, mid-career, and afterward he marveled at the stark changes in his professional life. Now that society saw him as male, his ideas were taken more seriously. He was able to complete a whole sentence without being interrupted by a man. A colleague who didn’t know he was transgender even praised his work as “much better than his sister’s.”

Clinics have reported an increase in people seeking medical gender transitions in recent years, and research suggests the number of people identifying as transgender has risen in the past decade. Touchstones such as Caitlyn Jenner’s transition, the bathroom controversy, and the Amazon series “Transparent” have also made the topic a bigger part of the political and cultural conversation.

But it is not always evident when someone has undergone a transition — especially if they have gone from female to male.

“The transgender guys have a relatively straightforward process — we just simply add testosterone and watch their bodies shift,” said Joshua Safer, executive director at the Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery at Mount Sinai Health System and Icahn School of Medicine in New York. “Within six months to a year they start to virilize — getting facial hair, a ruddier complexion, a change in body odor and a deepening of the voice.”

Transgender women have more difficulty “passing”; they tend to be bigger-boned and more masculine-looking, and these things are hard to reverse with hormone treatments, Safer said. “But the transgender men will go get jobs and the new boss doesn’t even know they’re trans.”

We spoke with four men who transitioned as adults to the bodies in which they feel more comfortable. Their experiences reveal that the gulf between how society treats women and men is in many ways as wide now as it was when Barres transitioned. But their diverse backgrounds provide further insight into how race and ethnicity inform the gender divide in subtle and sometimes surprising ways.

(Their words have been lightly edited for space and clarity.)

‘I’ll never call the police again’

Trystan Cotten, 50, Berkeley, Calif.

Professor of gender studies at California State University Stanislaus and editor of Transgress Press, which publishes books related to the transgender experience. Transitioned in 2008.

Life doesn’t get easier as an African American male. The way that police officers deal with me, the way that racism undermines my ability to feel safe in the world, affects my mobility, affects where I go. Other African American and Latino Americans grew up as boys and were taught to deal with that at an earlier age. I had to learn from my black and brown brothers about how to stay alive in my new body and retain some dignity while being demeaned by the cops.

One night somebody crashed a car into my neighbor’s house, and I called 911. I walk out to talk to the police officer, and he pulls a gun on me and says, “Stop! Stop! Get on the ground!” I turn around to see if there’s someone behind me, and he goes, “You! You! Get on the ground!” I’m in pajamas and barefoot. I get on the ground and he checks me, and afterward I said, “What was that all about?” He said, “You were moving kind of funny.” Later, people told me, “Man, you’re crazy. You never call the police.”

I get pulled over a lot more now. I GOT PULLED OVER MORE IN THE FIRST TWO YEARS AFTER MY TRANSITION THAN I DID THE ENTIRE 20 YEARS I WAS DRIVING BEFORE THAT.

Before, when I’d been stopped, even for real violations like driving 100 miles an hour, I got off. In fact, when it happened in Atlanta the officer and I got into a great conversation about the Braves. Now the first two questions they ask are: Do I have any weapons in the car, and am I on parole or probation?

Being a black man has changed the way I move in the world.

I used to walk quickly or run to catch a bus. Now I walk at a slower pace, and if I’m late I don’t dare rush. I am hyper-aware of making sudden or abrupt movements, especially in airports, train stations and other public places. I avoid engaging with unfamiliar white folks, especially white women. If they catch my eye, white women usually clutch their purses and cross the street. While I love urban aesthetics, I stopped wearing hoodies and traded my baggy jeans, oversized jerseys and colorful skullcaps for closefitting jeans, khakis and sweaters. These changes blunt assumptions that I’m going to snatch purses or merchandise, or jump the subway turnstile. The less visible I am, the better my chances of surviving.

But it’s not foolproof. I’m an academic sitting at a desk so I exercise where I can. I walked to the post office to mail some books and I put on this 40-pound weight vest that I walk around in. It was about 3 or 4 in the afternoon and I’m walking back and all of a sudden police officers drove up, got out of their car, and stopped. I had my earphones on so I didn’t know they were talking to me. I looked up and there’s a helicopter above. And now I can kind of see why people run, because you might live if you run, even if you haven’t done anything. This was in Emeryville, one of the wealthiest enclaves in Northern California, where there’s security galore. Someone had seen me walking to the post office and called in and said they saw a Muslim with an explosives vest. One cop, a white guy, picked it up and laughed and said, “Oh, I think I know what this is. This is a weight belt.”

It’s not only humiliating, but it creates anxiety on a daily basis. Before, I used to feel safe going up to a police officer if I was lost or needed directions. But I don’t do that anymore. I hike a lot, and if I’m out hiking and I see a dead body, I’ll keep on walking. I’ll never call the police again.

‘It now feels as though I am on my own’

Zander Keig, 52, San Diego

Coast Guard veteran. Works at Naval Medical Center San Diego as a clinical social work case manager. Editor of anthologies about transgender men. Started transition in 2005.

Prior to my transition, I was an outspoken radical feminist. I spoke up often, loudly and with confidence.

I was encouraged to speak up. I was given awards for my efforts, literally — it was like, “Oh, yeah, speak up, speak out.” When I speak up now, I am often given the direct or indirect message that I am “mansplaining,” “taking up too much space” or “asserting my white male heterosexual privilege.” Never mind that I am a first-generation Mexican American, a transsexual man, and married to the same woman I was with prior to my transition.

Prior to my transition, I rarely considered how men experienced life or what they thought, wanted or liked about their lives.

I have learned so much about the lives of men through my friendships with men, reading books and articles by and for men and through the men I serve as a licensed clinical social worker.

Social work is generally considered to be “female dominated,” with women making up about 80 percent of the profession in the United States. Currently I work exclusively with clinical nurse case managers, but in my previous position, as a medical social worker working with chronically homeless military veterans — mostly male — who were grappling with substance use disorder and severe mental illness, I was one of a few men among dozens of women.

Plenty of research shows that life events, medical conditions and family circumstances impact men and women differently. But when I would suggest that patient behavioral issues like anger or violence may be a symptom of trauma or depression, it would often get dismissed or outright challenged. The overarching theme was “men are violent” and there was “no excuse” for their actions.

I do notice that some women do expect me to acquiesce or concede to them more now: Let them speak first, let them board the bus first, let them sit down first, and so on. I also notice that in public spaces men are more collegial with me, which they express through verbal and nonverbal messages: head lifting when passing me on the sidewalk and using terms like “brother” and “boss man” to acknowledge me. As a former lesbian feminist, I was put off by the way that some women want to be treated by me, now that I am a man, because it violates a foundational belief I carry, which is that women are fully capable human beings who do not need men to acquiesce or concede to them.

What continues to strike me is the significant reduction in friendliness and kindness now extended to me in public spaces. It now feels as though I am on my own: No one, outside of family and close friends, is paying any attention to my well-being.

I can recall a moment where this difference hit home. A couple of years into my medical gender transition, I was traveling on a public bus early one weekend morning. There were six people on the bus, including me. One was a woman. She was talking on a mobile phone very loudly and remarked that “men are such a–holes.” I immediately looked up at her and then around at the other men. Not one had lifted his head to look at the woman or anyone else. The woman saw me look at her and then commented to the person she was speaking with about “some a–hole on the bus right now looking at me.” I was stunned, because I recall being in similar situations, but in the reverse, many times: A man would say or do something deemed obnoxious or offensive, and I would find solidarity with the women around me as we made eye contact, rolled our eyes and maybe even commented out loud on the situation. I’m not sure I understand why the men did not respond, but it made a lasting impression on me.

‘I took control of my career’

Chris Edwards, 49, Boston

Advertising creative director, public speaker and author of the memoir “Balls: It Takes Some to Get Some.” Transitioned in his mid-20s.

When I began my transition at age 26, a lot of my socialization came from the guys at work. For example, as a woman, I’d walk down the hall and bump into some of my female co-workers, and they’d say, “Hey, what’s up?” and I’d say, “Oh, I just got out of this client meeting. They killed all my scripts and now I have to go back and rewrite everything, blah blah blah. What’s up with you?” and then they’d tell me their stories. As a guy, I bump into a guy in the hall and he says, “What’s up?” and I launch into a story about my day and he’s already down the hall. And I’m thinking, well, that’s rude. So, I think, okay, well, I guess guys don’t really share, so next time I’ll keep it brief. By the third time, I realized you just nod.

The creative department is largely male, and the guys accepted me into the club. I learned by example and modeled my professional behavior accordingly. For example, I kept noticing that if guys wanted an assignment they’d just ask for it. If they wanted a raise or a promotion they’d ask for it. This was a foreign concept to me. As a woman, I never felt that it was polite to do that or that I had the power to do that. But after seeing it happen all around me I decided that if I felt I deserved something I was going to ask for it too. By doing that, I took control of my career. It was very empowering.

Apparently, people were only holding the door for me because I was a woman rather than out of common courtesy as I had assumed. Not just men, women too. I learned this the first time I left the house presenting as male, when a woman entered a department store in front of me and just let the door swing shut behind her. I was so caught off guard I walked into it face first.

When you’re socially transitioning, you want to blend in, not stand out, so it’s uncomfortable when little reminders pop up that you’re not like everybody else. I’m expected to know everything about sports. I like sports but I’m not in deep like a lot of guys. For example, I love watching football, but I never played the sport (wasn’t an option for girls back in my day) so there is a lot I don’t know. I remember the first time I was in a wedding as a groomsman. I was maybe three years into my transition and I was lined up for photos with all the other guys. And one of them shouted, “High school football pose!” and on cue everybody dropped down and squatted like the offensive line, and I was like, what the hell is going on? It was not instinctive to me since I never played. I tried to mirror what everyone was doing, but when you see the picture I’m kind of “offsides,” so to speak.

The hormones made me more impatient. I had lots of female friends and one of the qualities they loved about me was that I was a great listener. After being on testosterone, they informed me that my listening skills weren’t what they used to be. Here’s an example: I’m driving with one of my best friends, Beth, and I ask her “Is your sister meeting us for dinner?” Ten minutes later she’s still talking and I still have no idea if her sister is coming. So finally, I couldn’t take it anymore, and I snapped and said, “IS SHE COMING OR NOT?” And Beth was like, “You know, you used to like hearing all the backstory and how I’d get around to the answer. A lot of us have noticed you’ve become very impatient lately and we think it’s that damn testosterone!” It’s definitely true that some male behavior is governed by hormones. Instead of listening to a woman’s problem and being empathetic and nodding along, I would do the stereotypical guy thing — interrupt and provide a solution to cut the conversation short and move on. I’m trying to be better about this.

People ask if being a man made me more successful in my career. My answer is yes — but not for the reason you might think. As a man, I was finally comfortable in my own skin and that made me more confident. At work I noticed I was more direct: getting to the point, not apologizing before I said anything or tiptoeing around and trying to be delicate like I used to do. In meetings, I was more outspoken. I stopped posing my thoughts as questions. I’d say what I meant and what I wanted to happen instead of dropping hints and hoping people would read between the lines and pick up on what I really wanted. I was no longer shy about stating my opinions or defending my work. When I gave presentations I was brighter, funnier, more engaging. Not because I was a man. Because I was happy.

‘People assume I know the answer’

Alex Poon, 26, Boston

Project manager for Wayfair, an online home goods company. Alex is in the process of his physical transition; he did the chest surgery after college and started taking testosterone this spring.

Traditional Chinese culture is about conforming to your elders’ wishes and staying within gender boundaries. However, I grew up in the U.S., where I could explore my individuality and my own gender identity. When I was 15 I was attending an all-girls high school where we had to wear skirts, but I felt different from my peers. Around that point we began living with my Chinese grandfather towards the end of his life. He was so traditional and deeply set in his ways. I felt like I couldn’t cut my hair or dress how I wanted because I was afraid to upset him and have our last memories of each other be ruined.

Genetics are not in my favor for growing a lumberjack-style beard. Sometimes, Chinese faces are seen as “soft” with less defined jaw lines and a lack of facial fair. I worry that some of my feminine features like my “soft face” will make it hard to present as a masculine man, which is how I see myself. Instead, when people meet me for the first time, I’m often read as an effeminate man.

My voice has started cracking and becoming lower. Recently, I’ve been noticing the difference between being perceived as a woman versus being perceived as a man. I’ve been wondering how I can strike the right balance between remembering how it feels to be silenced and talked over with the privileges that come along with being perceived as a man. Now, when I lead meetings, I purposefully create pauses and moments where I try to draw others into the conversation and make space for everyone to contribute and ask questions.

People now assume I have logic, advice and seniority. They look at me and assume I know the answer, even when I don’t. I’ve been in meetings where everyone else in the room was a woman and more senior, yet I still got asked, “Alex, what do you think? We thought you would know.” I was at an all-team meeting with 40 people, and I was recognized by name for my team’s accomplishments. Whereas next to me, there was another successful team led by a woman, but she was never mentioned by name. I went up to her afterward and said, “Wow, that was not cool; your team actually did more than my team.” The stark difference made me feel uncomfortable and brought back feelings of when I had been in the same boat and not been given credit for my work.

When people thought I was a woman, they often gave me vague or roundabout answers when I asked a question. I’ve even had someone tell me, “If you just Googled it, you would know.” But now that I’m read as a man, I’ve found people give me direct and clear answers, even if it means they have to do some research on their own before getting back to me.

A part of me regrets not sharing with my grandfather who I truly am before he passed away. I wonder how our relationship might have been different if he had known this one piece about me and had still accepted me as his grandson. Traditionally, Chinese culture sees men as more valuable than women. Before, I was the youngest granddaughter, so the least important. Now, I’m the oldest grandson. I think about how he might have had different expectations or tried to instill certain traditional Chinese principles upon me more deeply, such as caring more about my grades or taking care of my siblings and elders. Though he never viewed me as a man, I ended up doing these things anyway.

Zander Keig contributed to this article in his personal capacity. The opinions expressed in this are the author’s own and do not reflect the view of the Department of Defense.

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Old story worth a repost SOURCE

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autumn-in-phandom · 7 years

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A review of "How WHITE is Dan?!- DNA TEST RESULTS"

I was riding in the car on the way to the store when I heard a familiar alert coming from my phone. I wondered aloud “Ooo is that Dan?” He was due to have a video out today or tomorrow, but it could be one of the few other channels I’m subscribed to. I’ve been psyched out before. I opened my phone and yes it was Dan and what was more, the word DNA was there. “They were right!” Those psychic IDB members with their “strong feelings” were right.

I for one didn’t think Dan would make this video. Mainly because he said so himself during a liveshow in the spring, shortly after Phil had posted his. He had admitted to taking the test as well, but the results were so vague and he was disappointed. I could relate, having bought DNA kits for my parents and getting very broad results, particularly for my mother’s side, which we wanted to know more about.

However, one shouldn’t take Daniel Howell at his word. He could be lying, or in this case he might just change his mind with the seasons. He wasn’t feeling it back then, but there was a hint in his last solo liveshow that he was thinking about ancestry again. The chat asked about “the grandma tweet” and he pulled up the photo of someone’s distant relative who had a strikingly similar face to his. Someone said it could be his great-grandmother, after all his own grandma was adopted. So reasonably, someone on IDB predicted that Dan would work this photo into his DNA video. After all Dan often sits on ideas for videos and then decides to make them when he feels the “the time is right” (or the topic is relevant).

Dan did indeed choose to make this video now for a specific reason, and while the photo may have inspired him, it didn’t make an appearance or get a mention. Apparently the driving force behind this video was current events. Current events that some fans were disappointed that Dan and Phil had not mentioned. The heated protests in Charlottesville, Virginia were mentioned in the first eight seconds:

“Hello Internet, in these times when apparently (camera zooms in on his lips) *some people* find it difficult to tell the difference between protesting racism and *racism*, I thought it would be relevant and mildly interesting to make a video about the shared genetic history of all humans by finding out *the origins of my ancestors*.“ (Cue the soft grey filter with fake lens flares, zen music and calm hand movements from Daniel).

I was immediately intrigued, but a bit skeptical. How was a video entitled "How WHITE is Dan?!” going to positively address racism? Especially knowing that his results were boring, so probably not that diverse. Well, he did it by following through on his topic sentence and actually showing the shared genetic history of all humans through maps of human migration. He also did some historic research into his small percentage of West African DNA. Of course the little sign in the background reading ‘AYY FUCK NAZIS’ and his black shirt with red Cyrillic letters that translate to “equality” were nice aesthetic touches.

Mind you, the actual factual human migration information comes later in the video. First we have sarcastic philosophical Dan waffling on about lizard people on Pangea slowly drifting apart “metaphorically and physically, until the inevitable nuclear apocalypse blows our planet into tiny chunks floating infinitely into the abyss of space” with a starry falling through space effect. Woah there nihilistic Dan, stay with us.

It’s okay, there is a quick jump cut that changes the tone immediately. It’s a mention of Phil and his DNA video, complete with a clip of “Science!Phil”. What’s more, Dan says that Phil ordered the DNA test kit for him. Perhaps, it’s just to set up his own reluctance, as he goes on to do just that. For some of us, the idea of Phil ordering DNA testing for both of them (even if it is to use in a video) paints a pretty domestic picture. Though in Phil’s video he says he was given his for free by a friend of the family who is a doctor, thinking it would make a cool video. Perhaps this is why neither of their videos seem to be sponsored by the DNA testing company, 23andMe. Or are they?

Cue relatable slightly paranoid Dan with some sharp humor about “laboratories” and being cloned and replaced “by a compliant artificial intelligence” by Mark Zuckerberg (thanks for knowing the correct spelling of that iPad) or “Zuck”, with a Stephen Hawking like voice saying “I’m coming for you Danny”. Dan of course gave a fake name for his DNA profile (as did Phil), but kept his date of birth. However he admits there isn’t really any point in trying to protect his identity on the internet. Okay, John Johnson.

“Are you ready! Am I ready? I have no idea what to expect to be honest.” Here’s the part where I have to suspend my disbelief and just accept that Dan pretending to react to these results as if he didn’t view them several months ago does make for a better video. Just like Dan pretending to play Bubble Bobble for the first time on the gaming channel in 2016, when in reality he tweeted about reaching level 100 with Phil back in 2009, did result in a very sweet gaming video.

Add a being related to a giraffe joke to the lizard one. I’m not sure if this is really helping the “one human race” thing, but it’s a pretty harmless joke. “Wow. Looking pretty white. That is one blue circle there, isn’t it JJ?” (the blue being European ancestry). Dan is 98.2% European and he jokes that this is the end of the video only a minute and half in.

Dan drags his ancestors for “literally” sticking to four countries (Britain, Ireland, France and Germany) when in reality those results are lumping Britain and Ireland together because they share so much common DNA, the same for French and German. He is also ignoring that 33.8% of his Northwest European genetics is broadly undefined and he hasn’t gotten to the Southern European, Scandinavian or West African parts yet. But I still found “really got out there and saw the world” quite funny. “Okay someone saw the sun at least” was a good one, though I wish he would have addressed his ability to tan darkly in this video, perhaps in the fair skin section. More on that below.

More relatable humor about not wanting to hike or get on a boat gets worked in to Dan finding out that he is not the least bit Asian or American. I vaguely recall a rumor about him being part Asian, let’s lay one that to rest. And I remember him hoping years ago that he might be part Native American because his grandma was adopted, but I found that extremely unlikely. Probably just a bit of wishful thinking perhaps brought on by being Team Jacob.

Now here is the part that interests me the most. On the Ancestry DNA test I gave to my parents, 1.8% was considered a “trace amount”, but in this 23andMe service they give a specific timeline for when each genetic group cropped up and the West African and Scandinavian both span from the late 1700s to mid 1800s, not that long ago. Dan concludes that “a ‘Scandi’ and a West African got it together” (insert graphic of the two countries coming together with a smooching sound effect). I’m not sure if that timeline is definitively saying they were a couple, but Dan’s Wikipedia research supports it and it is an interesting bit of history.

Segue into a brief farming family reunion story. 400 cousins, I’m sure. Shift to black and white and cue the unexplained mysteries music for Dan’s adopted grandmother mention. Dan “feels like there’s some epic adventure story there for another time”. Sign me the frick up! In fact please just bring your grandma onto one of your YouTube videos. She has always been the one Dan has been most comfortable talking about and even sharing pictures of. (Oh 'helo ther’ unflattering selfie from the Tinder spon on Dan’s computer).

I appreciate Dan showing the Haplogroup migrations of his paternal line, but in true Dan fashion it included commentary about “presumably wrestling mammoths and getting frozen or something” in Asia and “then buggered off to Europe to get bitten by a rat or something”. “And consistently had sex for thousands of years. Well done ancestors (Dan applauds) truly incredible story. Lord of the Rings. Ten out of ten. Would read again.” Lovely sarcastic Dan.

And as he hypes up “the fun stuff”, “weird things about your personality, health and biology”, and “intimate specific information” that he probably shouldn’t share with the Internet”, but he will because he’s “just a piece of meat”, I get hit with a mid video ad of Gwen Stefani applying mascara, because the cheeky bastard made this exactly ten minutes and one second long. (To be fair Phil did the same thing recently).

Dan has 300 Neanderthal variants, more than 82% of their customers. This is the same percentage as Phil, who talked about his head and brow shape and nasal chambers, but Dan uses this to relate to his “dank cave” dwelling habits (never opening the curtains of his bedroom). Based on his genetics, Dan is not likely to be a deep sleeper. “As I always say, why bother sleeping when you can stay awake thinking about stuff that makes you anxious. Right! Woo!” Dan addressing his mental health with humor, is always appreciated. I can actually see the power athlete possibility. He could be a big strong guy, but “wasted potential” and all that. (Personally my lazy self recoils at the idea of people dedicating so much of their time to training up their bodies to be these perfect machines, but hopeful D&P are spending some time at the gym for their general health.) “Looking at memes and talking about myself” is a great self-aware one liner.

Alright “cheek dimples”! Flop. What does this test know anyway? Stop referring to them as a deformity Dan, everyone loves your dimples! Okay I just did a bunch of reading on dimples and I guess they are considered a genetic deformity now a days. However on a social-biological level they may have all sorts of benefits, from being able to read emotions more clearly, to people wanting to procreate with you and not abandoning their cute babies. Dan has also been saying lately that he’s double deformed, but it is actually quite rare to have one side of your cheeks dimpled. (I used to have dimples as a child and all of a sudden they are back, but they are closer to my mouth than my smile lines and may just be from fat. Who knows.)

Alright good thing this isn’t a spon, calling the results “garbage”, “pseudoscience” and a “farce” even in jest, might not fly. Dan’s distrust of blonds Tweet is (at least partially) explained. I still think it might also relate to Dream Daddy and it is a mighty coinkidink that it was posted on the one year anniversary of Frank Ocean’s album. Promos all around? We just need to accept that Dan is a multilayered creature we will never fully understand. My husband will appreciate being compared to a unicorn though.

Dan’s pain kink and weird enjoyment of the dentist makes a resurgence! Please make a full video out of this Dan. We promise not to shame… much. “Scrape me Dad-”. Interestingly enough Phil has an average sensitivity pain but thought it would be higher, hates having his gums scraped and implied his dentist might be a sadist.

Dramatic build up and disclaimer for genetic health and increased risk of disease section. Feeling very relieved for the low risk of Altzheimers after reading that tear jerking dementia phanfic the other day (though it was Phil with the disease and I don’t think he mentioned it in his video). Dan was clearly worked up as well. He rests his face in his palm and is visibly pink and blotchy.

He balances the seriousness with an over the top dramatic reaction to being a carrier for red hair, complete with a black and white fake sobbing scene. I’ll admit I found his pause at “So you’re telling me that there’s a chance that I could have children— born with red hair” a bit distracting, though I’m sure it wasn’t mean that way. “There was no disclaimer for this one.” Ha. I case you didn’t know he’s just joking “you beautiful sunset heads, rub those freckles all over me.” Dan has made his love of ginger people quite clear in the past and this tends to start a discourse about Phil’s natural hair color.

I’ll weigh in on this. Phil was clearly ginger as a young child, just as Dan was blond when he was little. Both of their hair darkened quite a bit as they grew up, each becoming increasingly more brown. It’s harder to tell with Phil because he has denied his natural hair color for so long and seemingly makes up things about old photographs. Did he actually dye his hair before his first day of secondary school? Perhaps it was a bit of bleach that brighten it up and brought out the yellow/orange tones. In Phil’s Tinder spon he did admit to his hair getting a bit ginger during the summer. However by the time of his graduation, early university years and his appearance on 'The Weakest Link’ he had light-medium brown hair that I have a hard time considering a shade of auburn. You might call it nutmeg, but not cinnamon. I have medium auburn hair that has dulled with age, but does get more copper in the sun. But I don’t think Phil can be considered ginger anymore, especially as he chooses not to embrace it, so Dan’s love of ginger people seems completely separate from his fondness for Phil (except perhaps the freckles).

Moving on to skin pigmentation and the title of his video, “How white is Dan Howell?” He laughs at his genetically light skin. 39% Very fair, 32% Moderately fair and “at most 25% Light beige” and acknowledges his privilege. It would have been a great chance to maturely talk about his ability to tan when he was younger, relating to his Southern European and West African ancestry without making problematic 2010/2011 era jokes. However it seems paleness is part of Dan’s branding now (since Phil has clearly turned him into a vampire). Or it’s just the “never go outside”, “cave dwelling” schtick. We’ve all seen your freckles Dan.

In conclusion he hopes that people took something away from this be it “the possibility that [he] will have a ginger child in the future, that no one believes is [his], or that humanity has so much in common and we shouldn’t be divided by fascism, or that in the near future 'Zuck’ will be able to target ads to us based on our genetic code.” I sure hope it’s the middle one. “Ayy fuck Nazis”. Still, Dan gives us 20 years before society implodes. Finally he turns a joke about exercise into a confession about crying while reading the news. Seriously, well done Mr. Howell. (Nice promo for the casual and intimate liveshows too.)

This was a great contrast to Phil’s light hearted DNA results video with Science!Phil, CushionStack.com, buff kangaroo attraction, naked mole rats, Buffy Summers alias, “top of the morning to ya”, Phil’s French ear, German elbow, Swedish eyebrow and Sardinian freckle, alien jokes, celebrity haplogroups, testing out his photic sneeze reflex and short-term memory and talking about asparagus urine detection. Bless Phill. I love him, truly.

Both Dan and Phil’s videos do inspire me to send off the raw data of my parents DNA to a better company that can give me more detailed results. Maybe 23andMe. I’ve heard good things about the Human Genome Project as well. Ancestry DNA was pretty rubbish. 'Zuck’ and his wife should give these boys some money (if they haven’t already).

#daniel howell #silly pretentious video review for an actually good video #dan and phil #danisnotonfire #phan #d&p #dnp #*mine

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ceriousc · 4 years

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My Story

Just was watching an Alayna Joy video and it inspired me to talk about me for a minute. If it helps anyone then I'm glad I shared. Even if that one person it helps is just me. Here goes. I'm 42. I'm American. Born and raised here. I actually strongly hate being called African American. British people are just British, Canadians are just that. We are literally the only country doing this race thing. I'm human race and I'm over it. But I digress. When I was a child I was molested. My older teenage cousins male would touch me in places, rub their privates against me, until I thought it was normal. I remember asking an adult about the actual act and not saying it was being done to me. I was told it was called sex and we don't discuss that ever. Eventually it began to happen to me in my life quite often because I was taught so young not to talk about it I didn't. I remember trying to fit in with older female cousins. I was introduced one day to a game called hide n go get it. The rules were explained to me we seperated and we all split up while young boys searched for us in our hiding spaces. During this time I was caught and was told I had to have sex with a boy. I was 8 at the time. I preceded to go along with it. By this time it wasn't a big deal to me after all of the other stuff going on at the time. Everyone ridiculed and laughed at me. 8 years old being called a slut when you haven't even had the opportunity to develop yet. By 13 my aunt was paying me to watch her kids while her and her husband were supposed to go to work on the weekends. It was great. I'd spend from Thursday night to Sunday at their house. Early one morning after my aunt left for work. It had to be around 5:30ish in the morning, I was woken up by my nightshirt being pulled up and someone pressing their entire body on top of mine. Private being rubbed against my butt hands clasped over mind. Face down almost suffocating inside a pillow. There was a conversation on the way home later. I was told I was attractive. I know I wanted it. We were together now. This was my new hell. After a couple times I couldn't take it. I told someone and apparently I found out years later that an adult overheard and I was bragging about this. Mine you I was 13 at the time. He was in his 30's and married to my aunt and they had children together. But it was my fault I was bragging. I'm off track again. Anyway I stopped going over. He sent me roses and a card. My mother was immediately like what the hell. This isn't something am uncle sends to his niece. I tell her what happened. She believed me. We went to the police. I wasn't a virgin. Strike one. He is military. He took a polygraph test and passed. I get free counseling he gets nothing. My aunt later finds out he's on drugs. They get a divorce he leaves. He then marries a 17 year old girl. He's late 30's. Atleast she's legal but I'm a homewrecker now. I literally spend the rest of my teenage years being drunk and promiscuous. I realized early on in life that I was a lesbian. This was me punishing myself. Hating myself and just believing this is what I deserved. I remember crying and being depressed and self harming. Some people actually told my Mom I was a witch. I don't know why or where that came from but yeah my life. 15 I discovered strippers living on the next street over from my house. I was in heaven. That became my new hangout spot. I would give them back rubs, go to the store for their props ( honey, whip cream, baby oil etc.) I also got to take money at the door, take money in the kitchen while handing out plates of food and drinks. I did have to wear a button down white shirt tied up under my breast and short shorts. I had a grown up body by then. The owner wanted me to sleep with him but at that time I didn't care. I was making money and hanging around good looking totally naked women. School was horrible. I was the known slut. Home was even worse because well same. This house and job were my only outlet. My saviour from suicide. Until people who knew my family eventually told them that I was a dancer there which wasn't even true. But my life changed drastically after. I called that my rock bottom moment. I remember watching a show when I was an adult and the character said just because I'm next to hookers and dressed fancy doesn't mean I'm a hooker. I couldn't help but laugh because it's insane but so very accurate. I was so depressed I would cry all of the time. I wanted to die so badly. I remember praying to be ugly so guys would just leave me alone. If I were fat and ugly then no one would want me. My life would be better. So I stopped dieting, exercising, showering. Anything healthy I stopped doing it. Sad to say that carried over into my adulthood but we are still at teenaged me who now bad getting teased for bad hygiene. I eventually kind of cleaned up my act by junior year so I had to be 16 going on 17. I got accepted into a vocational during the morning and regular school the afternoon. I also got a job. A real tax write off job. So I wasn't drinking, I was pretty decent with my hygiene. No one told me about shaving or importance of skin care or just taking care of yourself in general. I was pretty good though. I had a steady boyfriend. Yep trying to fit in again. I wasn't doing good at school at this time. Bullying was a huge problem so I just started going to work after vocational school. Got incompletes like I thought so I just went to summer school and aced my classes. My steady boyfriend was upset because we weren't having sex. Sex became something I associated with depression and anger. It's a punishment. I didn't get why he was so upset we weren't doing that. Also he'd buy me flowers and make hair and nail appointments for me. I kept wondering why because when we met nothing about me said I was into those things. The only time I would dress up was if I had to for our class interviews or presentations. He started popping up at my job to surprise me with gifts and just get upset because he couldn't find me. Then it would turn into I came up to your job you said you were working where were you. My job I could've been doing a number of things. Cleaning out break room stalls in the back. We couldn't hear speakers back there and at that time loudspeakers were all we had. I hated doing cashiering so I avoided that typically anyone so I'd probably be outside waiting for stock trucks so I can do that. Outside can't loud speakers therefore can't get called to the register. We ended up breaking up after he proposed and we just realized we weren't right for each other. He was a great guy he just wasn't for me. I went back to punishing myself though. Blamed myself for our break up. My grades suffered, I lost my job, and just went to bad habits which included sleeping around again. Also went back to the strippers because they brought me joy. This older guy with money started checking me out. I ended up sleeping with him. It became a thing. I ran away from home and started living on his house boat. It was great at first. I was 17 with my own space. My mom was running around the neighborhood with posters asking have you seen this girl. I was a piece of shit for that. Yes I know. We left Michigan and we took a few strippers with us and moved to Florida. It was wild. The guy bought me clothes and other stuff I needed but he kept hinting at us starting a family. I was trying to figure my shit out. It scared me. We were in Pensacola Fl. When I got hit for the first time. My jaw and eye were swollen. I thought some of my teeth got knocked out too but they were still intact. We argued alot. Faught for a week and then he raped me. I thought the molestation was bad but being raped is 100 times worse. I can't even describe it. My friend immediately came when I called. I didn't want a hospital, no police, I just wanted to shower forever and die. That was my plan. Shower and die. I finally healed enough on the outside that I went home to my parents. I got home and didn't tell anyone about him. Hey I ran to Florida with some strippers. Think whatever you want. I couldn't stay at my house for long. I was having a hard time dealing with anything. Guy kept calling threatening my life and with everything else happening I left again. A guy I would hangout with was still a virgin I thought he was nice. He liked me he was going to Lansing for awhile. I went with him and his family. Me and him were sharing a room we had sex. He didn't see how painful that first time after messed with my head. I smiled got up hopped in the shower and balled my eyes out. Just cried until he knocked on the door. I didn't have any clothes so I had to share with him. I big breast and was walking around with a football Jersey and no bra looking like trash. That's how I was treated. He was nice. He bought me food, and anything that I needed he was cool about. He didn't know the Florida stuff I was dealing with. He knew what was going on at home but he didn't get to find out about Florida. No one did until now. I ended up finding out he was related to me. It's so important to find out your history for reasons like this. So yeah we ended up being cousins. I ended going to prom with my cousin as just my cousin although we had already slept together. Took pictures got my yearbook signed. The next day I joined the Navy. I had a whole year to train and get back in shape. I didn't do that. By the time the departure date came around I had changed my mind about going. I was told I signed up and I had to go. I found out later that wasn't true. There I was in the military. Not shaven. Terrible hygiene. Just overall terrible human being. Not into this. Hate authority figures. Can't stand rules of any kind. So we get haircuts. Uniforms. I rage first atleast two weeks straight. There is only 8. I see some women that I'm attracted to out of 80 women it was bound to happen. Then we have to run. Running was always horrible for me and I found out why. In the Navy where we run every morning. I had an asthma attack. They gave me treatment. I went to my barracks. More running another attack. I forget what day or what week stuff happens but I still get PTSD from coming on my period there. Outside no bathroom around. Immediate bathroom that is. Anyway my period came early. Probably due to stress. Messed up my uniform. There are certain days for you to wash your clothes. People have to clean those washers and dryers probably if they are not cleaned properly the whole crew gets demerits. My menstrual has always been horrible. Military was 10 times worse. I made it through to the end of the menstrual. I was constantly told my hair was growing too fast I needed it cut again. Didn't do that. Couldn't fold my bedding correctly. Was told to shave for swimming I didn't do that either. I know what you are thinking. I agree. I'm there with you. Hygiene has always been a struggle for me. It's my defense mechanism. It's how put a wall up since I can't put a physical one up. I ended up stepping on this girls foot who I didn't know while marching and wearing steel toe boots. We clicked immediately. Fast friends. I fell in love shortly after and didn't know it. I just knew I had to always be around her. I remember once going to the shower. I saw her waiting in line. The way we did showers were two people to a stall. I would've had to shower with her if I hadn't turned around and traded clean up days with a friend so I could shower last and alone. Later before I could jump into bed she asked me why I left showers. I completely played the wtf are you talking about card. She's like I saw you walk in. I'm like oh I didn't see you. I forgot something then just decided to study some more for that test tomorrow. Now everyone knew I didn't do the physical part of training before bootcamp but I memorized that entire book we were given by our recruiter. Basically I just could skim it and it would all come back to me. Graciously she let it go and I went to bed but this kept going for weeks. One day she finally said I know a girl back home like you. I was horrified and shocked. I never had been with a woman, hadn't kissed a girl, nothing with a girl except love her from afar so when she called me on it I was speechless. I went to bed. We had a qualifying run the next day and I think my panic attack I was already having, mixed with asthma attack, and almost became a heartattack. Either way I was told right before graduating and after receiving awards for most improved cadet that I had to leave. 7th week 2nd day only five more days to go. I wouldn't graduate. We laid in bed and I got to hold her and tell her goodbye as we cried. She didn't love me but we were friends and I still miss her dearly. My life didn't get much better after that. I was eventually diagnosed with bipolar depression, anxiety, and PTSD. I did some terrible things in my life. I had some terrible things done to me. I came out as bi after bootcamp. I was raped two more times. I have grown to try and deal with it. Alot of people blame me identifying as lesbian now as it has or had something to do with me being raped or molested. I can honestly say that for as long as I can remember I've always loved women. I've always been attracted to women. I have acknowledged a man being handsome. I have consentually dated and slept with men. I just realized when I became older those moments were never for the right reasons. Everyone story is different. Your isn't going to be my story. You might hate everything that I've said. That's fine if you do. Your a human being. You matter.. Your ideas matter and I love you for your diversity! Love one another!!

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archandbillwiseguys · 6 years

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Review: Sorry to Bother You

July 20, 2018

Arch: Have you seen Sorry to Bother You?

Bill: It’s one of my favorite movies so far this year. What an ingenious, dark fantasy.

Arch: I sat there and screamed with laughter the entire time, and so did the audience. They were just ripping the chairs, screaming. It’s one of the greatest audience reactions I’ve seen in years.

Bill: I envy you. I saw it in a nearly empty theater, so I was laughing to myself, pretty much. It seems like the kind of movie that’s even better with more people around you.

Arch: It’s just so perfect, starting with the lead character, Cassius, played by Lakeith Stanfield. He goes to work at a telemarketing call center in Oakland, California, but people keep hanging up on him.

Bill: We must mention that each time he makes a sales call, his office desk physically crashes into the living room of the person he’s calling, so we see them talking face-to-face. It’s the moment when we realize we’re in the presence of a deliciously twisted mind.

Arch: I know! Who thinks of stuff like that? Anyway, one of his co-workers is played by Danny Glover. He tells Cassius his natural African American voice is holding him back from making sales, and suggests he’ll be more successful if he uses his “white voice!”

Bill: Yes! And he opens his mouth and out comes the voice of David Cross, the actor, who is just about the whitest guy in show business.

Arch: It’s a brilliant conceit — that we all use different voices for the situations we’re in.

Bill: And, of course, there’s the notion that even today black people need to find ways to ingratiate themselves with white society. It’s what makes Sorry to Bother You sort of a companion piece to Get Out, from last year.

Arch: Both of these films seem to come from the same place.

Bill: Right down to the star, Lakeith Stanfield, who was also in Get Out. He played the hero’s old friend who was kidnapped and literally possessed by white people.

Arch: I think he’s marvelous. And of course as he progresses up the ladder at the telemarketing company, he realizes he’s part of a conspiracy to enslave the entire country.

Bill: The evil CEO is played by Armie Hammer, and he’s hilarious.

Arch: From there it goes into science fiction.

Bill: We really can’t reveal any more than that.

Arch: Heavens, no! A couple of reviewers have knocked the movie for going off the rails — but for me, the fact that it DOES go off the rails is what makes it so wonderful.

Bill: This movie not only goes off the rails, the train barrels down Main Street and plows into a fireworks factory.

Arch: I loved it.

Bill: This is one of those movies that rewards you every minute you watch it. Which is not to say it never stops to take a breath — it’s wonderfully paced. But each minute brings some reason to smile to yourself, or laugh out loud, or contemplate a larger idea.

Arch: It’s written and directed by a fellow named Boots Riley, who’s a hip-hop artist. This is his first movie, and it’s a remarkable accomplishment.

Bill: He’s clearly inspired by other films. He’s obviously a fan of Michel Gondry, who made Being John Malkovich — and in fact, in the middle of the film we see a short animated movie that’s a flat-out tribute to Gondry. There are echoes of Office Space and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. And if you think about it, Cassius’ voyage to the underbelly of his corporate culture is strikingly similar to Pinocchio’s visit to Pleasure Island.

Arch: Should that come with a spoiler alert?

Bill: Nah — NOTHING prepares you for where this movie goes!

Arch: That’s what I love about it.

Bill: We must say a word about the cast — every one of the actors is appealing.

Arch: Cassius’ girlfriend is played by Tessa Thompson, who was in a TV series called Dear White People. I find her delightful.

Bill: She’s wonderful and funny. She also plays a corporate honcho on Westworld.

Arch:And she just played Valkyrie in the last Thormovie. A lot of people have been offended by a scene in Sorry to Bother Youwhere she stands on a stage, nearly naked, and invites people to pelt her with cell phones and douse her in sheep’s blood.

Bill: Well, now YOU’RE spoiling!

Arch: Do you think so?

Bill: Not really. She plays a performance artist. It’s what they do.

Arch: But the film has all sorts of little moments like that, things that stick with you.

Bill: You know what might be my favorite scene in the film? And it doesn’t have much of anything to do with the plot. It’s in the beginning when Cassius is just scraping by financially, and he and some friends go out in his old beat-up car. It starts to rain, and the only way they can make the windshield wipers work is with a rope attached to the wiper arms. The driver pulls them one way and the passenger pulls them the other way. They’re all laughing and chatting, and having the best time. It’s such a warm, friendly moment, a portrait of people who have virtually nothing, but they also don’t have a care in the world.

Arch: Every frame of this movie there’s something to love! Like when he goes to a gas station and tells the attendant “40 on pump one.” And he means 40 cents!

Bill: I actually did that once. Or maybe a few dozen times.

Arch: Yes, but that was when gas was 40 cents a gallon.

Bill: And a guy in a white hat checked my oil.

Arch: This film just made me happy. Sorry to Bother Youis simply one of the most creative and brilliant movies of the year.

Bill: Maybe we should just stop going to the movies this year and end on a high note.

Arch: What, and give up all this fame and fortune?

Bill: Please…just one fantasy a week, okay?

#sorry to bother you #danny glover #lakeith stanfield

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viralhottopics · 7 years

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Theaster Gates: ‘I want to believe that there is power in my poverty’

The Chicagoan artist, who made a name for himself with his art-meets-urban regeneration projects in the city, is back in a gallery with work that challenges assumptions about race, class and what it means to be poor

Earlier this decade the artist Theaster Gates began dropping hints that he might not be long for the confines of the art world. Instead,Gates said, he wanted to focus on what he called practicing life. What could be interpreted as an abstract idea made sense when you look at Gatess work, most prominently a series of project spaces in South Side Chicago that located art outside the walls of galleries and institutions.

In the African-American neighborhood south of the Midway, Gates gutted a string of condemned buildings and then turned them into sculpture, covertly turning his collectors into patrons of urban renewal. If you draw a circle around a thing, stand in the middle of the thing, invite others to stand in it with you and pray and work and move your body, that place wont be the same any more, he says of the project.

He took former crack houses and turned them into cinemas, showing everything from Mario Van Peebles back catalog to Carwash. Under his guidance, a crumbling bank became a center for art and held dance classes. Along with Turner Prize winners, Assemble, hes at the heart of a new way of thinking of regeneration as art itself.

It is a time-honored role for artist as designator, to point at the stuff of the physical world and revision it as art, harkening back to the readymade. But Gates decision to bump off from art and live in the sphere of dirt, the dirty, the stuff that we think is in the ground was revelatory, leading to invitations to Davos and a TED Talk, where he talked about how he revived a neighborhood with imagination and hard graft. In the insistence that the scrap material framing black lives has important pedigree and in the starkness by which Gates interventions with lumber and screws made refuse into investment-class commodity was also the flat-out thrill of seeing a broken trickle system work, even but once.

Now hes back with But To Be A Poor Race, Gates first show with Los Angeles gallery Regen Projects, and he is in Washington DC with an invitation to the White House in the final days of the Obama presidency.I feel like Im settling into my values, says Gates, who will follow the Regen Projects show with an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art. It is a set of things that I want to explore deeply, like, where does real power come from? What does one do with power? And whos really the poor race, and who really won?

Theaster Gatess Line Drawing for Black People. Photograph: Brian Forrest/Courtesy the artist and Regen Projects, Los Angeles

Gatess new show takes those questions further and draws its title from the WEB DuBois book The Souls of Black Folk, and the NAACP co-founders line about that greatest of hardships, but to be a poor race in the land of dollars. Canonized as a sociologist and civil-rights activist, DuBois created visualization aids for the 1900 Paris Exposition charts showing black achievement in the 40 years after the end of the Civil War. By documenting how many people owned their homes or owned land, had kitchen appliances or farm apparatuses, or went to college, DuBois and his colleagues turned statistics into unfurling lines and the blocks of color that united them. They were not only great and handy at the thing that we know theyre great and handy at, but DuBois was an artist, Gates says. There was no market for his artistry except for the invention of black platforms that would elevate black people.

Like Gates color-field paintings responding to DuBois datasets, a new suite of tar paintings made on-site in Los Angeles bind mark-making to its labors. The paintings situate black resilience and longing within the history of abstraction, when post-war artists such as Barnett Newman sought another way to confront the damage without reinforcing it through representation, lest we become victim to it and believe that is ultimately the truth, as Gates explains. An inability to face the horrors of violence, and a desire to sing a new steadier song abstraction, thats what abstraction is. Within the refusal to be literal also is the repositing of what it means to be a byproduct of a certain poverty, a certain poorness, to use [DuBois] term, is an imaginative resilience that then allows people to conjure things, Gates says.

The work also confronts ideas of appropriation and imperialism head on. A bronze sculpture from a series recalling African reliquary masks in But To Be A Poor Race pulls even deeper past, heavy with the shifting weight of talismans into requisitioned modernist forms. They were pillaging our shit, Gates says, speaking of the modernists, who were influenced by deliberately abstracted proportions and forms in African figural carvings, often meant to represent more than one person. As they were creating a gross poverty, a systematic poverty, they were at the same time feeding themselves the kind of black philosophy that would yield a new era of art, would bring them out of the artistic dark ages.

These objects for me are studies in black power. I want to be in conversation with black power, and Gates does not mean anything as temporal as the 1960s. I want to ask my ancestors things. Like, how did you figure out the orchestration of stars, and do it with such precision?

When Gates travels, he says he is often asked about the violence in Chicago, and he goes instead to the lives that are unamplified: the intellectual rigor, the care that black people have for one another, he says. Instead of just pondering it with the western rational mind, I want to get in the zone of the ecstatic, of the hallucinogenic, of the otherworldly. I want to get in the zone of the eternal. I want to be inside of those sculptural objects. I want to re-ritualize. I want to knead them so they might be a channel for power, be a protection from powers, be a hedge around my head, be the hem of Christs garment. I want to believe that there is power in my poverty.

Gates, who has worked in clay and once created a fictional Japanese potter to be the ostensible author of his work in mud and water, has infused humble materials with mythology, over and again. From the roots of gospel, his band The Black Monks of Mississippi bend their voices towards something incantatory, a hum from these bodies and also beyond it. In a video at Regen Projects, Sweet Land of Liberty, the stanzas of the American patriotic anthem My Country Tis of Thee disintegrate in Gates singing of them, into the soft, fine romantic dream fragments of we land of liberty, from every mountainside, and let freedom ring. Theyre actually so beautiful, the kind of movement from one note to the next; theyre like salves, he says. Its like Mariah Carey missing her lip sync. All I can do is try to mouth these things. I can entertain people with the lyrics, the same way a modernist could grab an image of a big nose or a Fijian girl and put it in a painting. I could appropriate the lyric of white power, but in fact I am still just part of a poor race.

In another clip, Gates catches the singer Yaw Agyeman coming out of a chant of devotion and overlays it with the rising intro notes of Soul Train, the long-running Chicago-born institution and unifying mechanism where people could gather and dance. And so I decided to counterbalance Yaws nam myoho, which is a way to channel a meditative unity by using sound, Gates says of his own filmed duet, and the shared sounds that, in a way, dont have meanings in and of themselves, but when done with others make meaning. In these diverse mediums, Gates interrogations and redemptions of black history take visibility as pliable, and thus too are the makings of power, spun through this life and out of our attentions: To be a poor race is a gift, he says, if you can see the richness.

But To Be A Poor Race opens at Regen Projects in Los Angeles on 14 January