I first encountered Gloria Steinem in the 1960s in the pages of Glamour magazine. I don’t remember what she was writing about, though it was a number of articles over a couple of years – she wrote for them regularly, though I have not yet seen a mention of that particular magazine in the obituaries.
I can’t tell you who else wrote for Glamour back then, or much of what else was in the magazine. It was aimed at selling beauty products and clothes to young women and most of the articles promoted that in some way. It was, in many ways, the antithesis of MS. magazine, which Steinem and others started a few years later.
But I noticed Steinem from the first piece of hers I read. It was smart. She clearly had something to say. And after that, I sought out issues of the magazine that had an article by her.
I was a young teenager, but I disdained the magazines aimed at people my age. After all, I was already reading adult fiction and had been since about the age of 10. (Young adult fiction was laughable back then. Sue Barton, Student Nurse. I outgrew that by the age of 8.)
Even Seventeen seemed too childish for me, but Glamour (which was probably aimed at people in their late teens, early 20s) struck me as sophisticated without being out of reach, like Vogue was.
And yes, I read more serious magazines as well. The New Yorker (albeit mostly the cartoons). The Atlantic. The Texas Observer. But I was a young girl trying to figure out where I fit into the world, so I turned to Glamour as well.
Having read a lot of her work, I took Steinem very seriously when she got involved in second wave feminism and started MS. I continued to take her seriously throughout her life. Continue reading “The Importance of Writers”…
I once almost got into a fight with a Beefeater in the Tower of London when I dared suggest that Shakespeare might have been wrong about Richard III killing off his nephews. Shakespeare’s version of the story has become enshrined as something “everybody knows.” And “everybody knows” is a problem if you want to get something right.
I was thinking about this while re-reading Black London,* a terrific and fascinating book by Gretchen Gerzina about the history of Africans in England. Early in the book Gerzina tells of going into a bookstore looking for material about people of color in London. The saleswoman told her, with a touch of asperity, that everyone knew that there were no blacks in England prior to the end of WW II.
In fact, there were so many blacks in England during the reign of Elizabeth I that she issued an edict ordering them to leave the country (it was largely ignored). And slavery, which we in America tend to think of as our own “peculiar institution,” was legal in England until as late as 1772. There were African slaves in England–most of them domestics–because up until that point there had been no specific law against slavery.
What changed? A slave named James Somersett, brought by his owner to England from the Massachusetts colony, was beaten and left to die by his owner, Charles Stewart. Instead, he was rescued, taken to the hospital, and when he was well, apprenticed as a free man. By chance, a year or so later, Stewart saw his erstwhile slave, hale and productive, and demanded that the man be returned to him. A huge legal battle ensued, with public opinion vocally divided. The judiciary was forced to make case law, finding that, while colonial laws might explicitly permit slavery, there was no Parliamentary act or common law that made slavery in England legal, and that it was therefore illegal.
Somersett was freed, as were the 10,000 or so African slaves in England.
The slave trade continued, making port cities like Bristol and Plymouth into centers of commerce; slavery in the British colonies flourished. But the abolitionist movement, stirred to life by the Somersett case, struggled against economic interests, and in 1807 the slave trade in England was abolished. It took almost thirty more years (1834) for the institution itself to be banned throughout the Empire.
That means that during Jane Austen’s lifetime there were black people in England. It’s clear (particularly from Mansfield Park) that Austen was well aware of the slave trade as it was practiced in the British colonies, and her letters suggest that she was part of the abolitionist camp. Austen did not live a cosmopolitain life (she disliked London and Bath) but it is not unlikely that she encountered black Britons–those persons who had lived in England as domestics for decades, or had come to Britain after the American Revolution (many slaves were promised freedom by the Crown if they fought for England, and some took the offer and wound up there after the war–albeit not always very happily). There was a tendency among white Britons to lump all people of color together, but at the same time freed slaves were arriving from America, immigrants from the British colony of India were arriving too. My favorite is the Bengali entrepreneur who introduced the word “shampoo” — meaning head massage — into the English language. He was considered “black.” He operated a spa (Mahomed’s Steam and Vapor Sea Water Medicated Baths) which offered a combined Turkish bath with massage (sounds great). As the British Empire spread its influence, there were more and more persons of color in England. The clerk Gerzina encountered at the bookstore may have cited “everybody” in her opinion, but she was dead wrong.
Whenever I hear someone saying “everybody knows,” I’m pretty sure I’m in for a whopping historical error.
_____ * Yes, I’m researching for Sarah Tolerance #5...
I’m so late today that I’m (almost) posting on your tomorrow… which was my tomorrow over 15 hours ago. It’s been a busy day and was a busy yesterday and I’m so tired that I want to use colloquialisms. I shall refrain, because Australian colloquialisms can read as rather rude to North Americans.
Yesterday afternoon I finished with my end of the proofs of the forthcoming novel, then I went to a book launch. Then I had an online meeting and we updated each other on antisemitism. There were other things, too, but I forget. I did all this with the eye problems and every minute the world felt funky.
This morning was a grocery delivery and an emergency printout of stuff for a friend (at which point my printer failed) and we have a weather shift (it being spring here) and so my joints reminded me they hate weather. All my joints. Why the little toe aching is more annoying than the back aching is something I cannot work out.
I ought to be celebrating receiving copies of the German translation of one of my favourite short stories. There is an academic comment on my sense if humour, so my sense of humour is officially an academic thing now. In German academia. This is important, because a French translation of another story, a while back, turned all the subtlety into sarcasm and the story was not funny at all.
I’m also giving a workshop for ConSYDeration in two weeks. ConSYDeration is part of the Sydney Fringe Festival and this is my first time even getting to the Fringe. Which means, of course, my next thing is to update my handout for the workshop because I forgot to add my list of publications. It’s not gratuitous advertising this time round – my non-fiction is directly relevant to the workshop.
And all this is why, in a few minutes, I’m going to make a cuppa and watch some William Hartnell Doctor Who for a bit. I have so much to do but my body tells me to be gentle. I might put a bit of cinnamon in my tea. Later I’ll do more of the things.
I have been considering my New year, which is way soon. If anyone wants either or both of my grandmothers’ honey cake recipes here, next week, just say and I will oblige.
So last weekend I was trying to get a Covid vaccine and came up against a frightening development in our society. And no, it wasn’t the fact that after six years and change we are still dealing with this damn virus.
I have major travel plans in September, so I wanted to get the vaccine a couple of weeks before my trip so I’ll be at peak protection when I get on a plane. Travel plans have generally dictated how I schedule my shots, which I get every six months.
I checked the CVS website, but couldn’t find any appointments at the one nearest me. Then I checked Walgreens, and they had appointments through August 23, but not afterwards. The new vaccine drops in mid-September – while I’m traveling – so I assumed they weren’t going to order any more vaccines if they ran out.
So I made an appointment for August 22 at the closest Walgreens. Walgreens sent me 9 messages via text and email confirming my appointment and reminding me of it.
I showed up right on time, only to be informed that they didn’t have it. “But I have an appointment,” I said. The pharmacist looked at me like I was crazy for assuming I could get a vaccine when I had an appointment. He didn’t apologize, but told me I could complain to “corporate.”
I got a cancellation text 10 minutes after I left the drugstore.
I was furious, of course. Fortunately, a friend mentioned that a major grocery chain in her area still had vaccines, so I decided to check with Safeway.
Their website said they did and that they took walk-ins, so I walked over on Sunday afternoon to get one, only to discover that they don’t do vaccines in the last hour the pharmacy is open (no, the website doesn’t mention that).
But the clerk confirmed they still had the vaccine in stock. I asked if they would still have it Tuesday – I had plans on Monday – and she said maybe, but “corporate” might decide to have all the vaccines shipped back at any moment.
And that’s when it hit me, with that second reference to “corporate,” that big companies control a large part of our lives these days without us having any right to push back at how they do it.
I took the Safeway clerk at her word, changed my Monday plans, showed up when they started doing vaccines at 10 am, and got my shot from a very nice pharmacist. But “corporate” was still pinging in my head. Continue reading “Under “Corporate’s” Thumb”…
This is so important to those affected by LGBTQ+ stigma and those who love them, I am reprinting it in its entirety (under Creative Commons license).
Childhood experiences of LGBTQ+ stigma can harm romantic relationships decades later – psychologists explain how to reconnect with yourself and your partner
Childhood rejection, discrimination and bullying can affect your well-being as an adult. If your friends, family or community pushed you away because of your sexuality or gender, these childhood experiences of prejudice can also affect your future relationships.
We found that a factor called internalized stigma can notably affect the romantic relationships of LGBTQ+ people. Internalized stigma refers to when society’s negative views and biases toward a part of your identity shapes how you think and feel about yourself. This can influence how you view romantic relationships and how you interact with your romantic partners.
People with higher levels of internalized stigma report more conflicts and less satisfaction in their relationships. Research suggests that internalized stigma can negatively affect key aspects of romantic relationships that keep people satisfied with their partners, including trust, connection and intimacy.
Internalized stigma can also shape how secure you feel in romantic relationships. For some, these negative self-views can lead to difficulties with commitment and more conflict between partners.
In our study of 80 LGBTQ+ couples, we found that childhood emotional wounds tied to sexuality or gender can carry into adulthood, shaping a person’s relationships in their 20s and 30s.
Specifically, LGBTQ+ adults with more childhood anti-LGBTQ+ experiences reported less trust in their partner and reduced emotional and sexual intimacy – key ingredients in a healthy and satisfying romantic relationship.
Overcoming childhood trauma
It’s worth remembering that these negative beliefs about yourself don’t develop overnight. It also takes time to recognize and change how you react to them.
Exploring whether your symptoms of guilt, shame and low self-esteem are related to internalized stigma is a critical part of beginning to navigate it. Recognizing and pinpointing where these beliefs came from, which may include negative messages from society or your family, is an important first step.
Show yourself patience and acceptance after difficult moments, such as when you’re feeling undervalued, alone or ashamed because of your sexuality or gender. Adopting mantras such as “I am enough,” “I can overcome hard things” and “May I be kind to myself and give myself compassion in this moment” is one way to practice self-affirmation.
You may also want to explore how shame and guilt around your sexual or gender identities can show up in your relationships. Intentionally carving out ways to support and connect with your partner can create emotional safety by building intimacy and closeness.
Importantly, stigma and shame don’t have to become the only thing you and your partner talk about. Strengthening positive aspects of your relationship can help you continue finding ways to bond.
Finding and giving support
Talking with your partner or other community members who have had similar experiences may provide a sense of connection.
Online self-directed relationship programs that are tailored for LGBTQ+ relationships may be more approachable. Find trained providers who are LGBTQ+ friendly, affirming and willing to advocate for your needs.
Lastly, recognize that the onus for change is not solely on you and your partner. Change also needs to come at a societal level. You can empower yourself and others by connecting with other people in the LGBTQ+ community, including mentoring LGBTQ+ youth. Many face similar experiences, and you are not alone.
I don’t talk about Patreon much, but I’ve had a place there for a while. Once a month I send subscribers a short story, an old essay, a new one, some writing advice, and what’s happening behind the scenes. Everyone receives a recipe or two once a week, on the blog. Most patrons receive the short story. A lesser number (but still most) subscribe to the essay tier, and some subscribe to it at a level that means they get to choose what I write a new essay about, and so forth. This week I’d like to share with you some of my writing advice. it’s half of what’s in the newsletter, and it lets you see what that tier is about.
One of the new essays was about the colour ‘blue.’ I’d like to riff on that refrain and return to world building. Two birds, one stone.
There are some simple tools that help convince your reader that they walk in a strange world and not all of those tools involve flying cars or weird monsters. One of the easiest is colour. Science fiction TV often used to spray paint vegetation blue or orange to let viewers know “They walk in strange soil.” Writers have better choices than spray paint.
If someone returns home after a voyage (Odysseus!) and sees the familiar purple leaves and their comforting orange spots, that’s spray paint. The emotions help show the reader what they’re supposed to feel about the character and about the character’s relationship to the landscape, and the colours show that the world he sees is not ours. This gives the story some life using a few words or a single paragraph. If you want the past voyage to have changed them, you bring it into play. If the leaves are edible, even better. The character can pick a leaf and nibble it then recoil. What was sweet when they left their home has changed. If you want the landscape to have been changed by aliens (us!) invading and making it edible for our bodies, then you show this. The colour is no longer spray paint: it is integral to the story.
It’s really that simple. It works with all five senses, or with objects. Make it integral to the story by having a character interacting with it, and make that interaction show something important to the reader, or, in this case, a mini-story: noting the colour, reacting to it, tasting the leaf, reacting to it, realising that all has changed. That miniature story uses colour to enrich a landscape and bring it to life, while helping round the character out and give the reader a reminder of what has happened. Small things can have big impacts.
I did a podcast last weekend that focused on how the broligarchs miss the point when it comes to most science fiction, including the stuff they cite as influencing them. This was BCube Press podcast hosted by Cliff Winnig with myself and Wendy Shaffer as guests. You can watch it here on YouTube.
We had a great discussion, but there’s so much to be said on this topic, plus right now I’m reading Gil Duran’s new book The Nerd Reich, so I’m thinking a lot about what these technofeudalists are doing to undermine democracy based on their half-baked philosophy and complete misunderstanding of both science and science fiction.
(I’ll write about The Nerd Reich when I finish the book, but I can already tell you it’s worth your time even if you, like me, are obsessed with the subject and already know a lot of this. Duran is a journalist by training, so he marshals his facts and writes with clarity.)
Back when I was in college – an absurdly long time ago – there were four SF/F books (or series of books) that pretty much everybody read: the Foundation trilogy, Stranger in a Strange Land, Dune, and the Lord of the Rings. Those books didn’t get me into SF/F – that came later when I discovered the great feminist SF of the 70s – but they were part of the overall 60s-70s culture.
What gets me is that the broligarch crowd pretty much read the same books – and clearly missed the point of most of them – even though the oldest of those tech-adjacent guys is probably a generation younger than I am and many of them are millennials. And of course, Foundation and Lord of the Rings had been around quite awhile before my generation found them.
Now I’m not dissing those books. I embroidered a quote from Foundation on the backpack I carried when I went hitch-hiking across the country (“Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.”) I worked as a children’s book buyer for Grok Books (which didn’t have a great SF section, but did have that particular novel).
And I re-read the entire Lord of the Rings during law school finals every semester.
Dune was fun if you were smoking a lot of dope.
But you know, all those books were written before any of these guys were born. And there’s been a hell of a lot of good science fiction written since then. Yet these books still seem to attract their interest. Continue reading “The Broligarch Misreading of Science Fiction”…
I stumbled upon an essay I wrote some years ago yesterday. It’s a pretty good piece, kind of funny, part of my ongoing “Raised in a Barn” series of anecdotes about my odd childhood. I finished it, was pretty happy with it still… and then the thought occurred to me: it’s weird that I do this. This being: write essays retelling anecdotes about my parents, the Barn, bats and Christmas trees and the trapeze that hung in our hallway, et cetera.
I mean, what’s the point? Writing fiction, you’re creating a world, and characters, and a narrative arc. Anecdotes may have characters and certainly take place in a world, and often they have a narrative arc, because otherwise it’s just… someone writing something that sounds like “My uncle had a frog named Bertram,” wth no therefore.
I think about this because I have been toying, off and on, with the idea of blowing my “Raised in a Barn” anecdotes up into a memoir. That’s hard because I run aground on “what’s the point,” or rather “why would this matter to anyone else?”
Memoir is a thriving subsection of American letters. Particularly popular are the “how I survived” memoirs, which range from true-life horror stories by survivors of crimes or horrific events, to “I had psychotic parents and I’m here to spill the tea” to “I left my abusive significant other, and you can too” to “I survived all that medical science could do to me, and I’m cured, but I’m still angry.” Survival memoirs can be instructional or inspirational, and some them are very angry.
Some memoirs are less about survival than they are about “what the hell happened?” Many memoirs by famous people, particularly famous women, fall under that banner. They promise the inside skinny, the truth that the news or TikTok or Instagram won’t tell you. Sometimes they’re inspirational too. And there are memoirs that are less about the author and more about evoking a time and place.
I have read memoirs that failed because they had no there there–the equivalent of talking about Uncle Fred and his frog Bertram. Books where the author (and presumably the publisher) thought there was something compelling about their story, what they lived through, saw, survived, but that missed that narrative arc. Maybe they thought it was implicit, but it wasn’t. If I read a memoir and I don’t come out of it with a sense of what the author really wanted me to know (beyond, say Abusive Spouses Are Bad! or Running for President is Unpleasant!) I don’t think it works.
It takes a certain mindset to write a memoir. You have to be convinced that other people will care about a story you’re telling about YOU. That requires some audacity, doesn’t it? To believe that your story will have meaning to anyone else? Audacity is a well-known tool in the writer’s kit, right there with grammar and spelling.
I spent the past weekend among family at the celebration of life for my late and entirely wonderful Aunt Julie. There was a graveside meet up (it was non-religious, so calling it a service is a misnomer) at which I spoke–and there were probably 30 or so people there, including caregivers, a co-worker, friends, and of course, family. And we all told stories about Aunt Julie and what made her so delightful, and there were tears and a whole lot of laughter. It was effortless to tell these stories, because everyone there loved my aunt. That was the point: to share the different aspects of my aunt’s life and her character and to celebrate her. The stories had meaning for everyone there.
If I’m going to write a memoir (and I haven’t talked myself out of it just yet) I need to have–not just the audacity to believe that someone is going to find meaning in it, but a narrative arc that creates that meaning.
The New York Timeshas an interview with Morgan Freeman, who is 89 – he in fact says “pushing 90” – and still working. At the moment he’s got a regular role on a streaming series.
I am a sucker for all reports about people who are older than I am and still pursuing their art or their career or doing something else that we’re all told is “unusual” for old people. I want to be reminded that getting old doesn’t mean you have to stop doing stuff and just wait around to die.
But there’s a hell of a lot of ageism out there right now and it’s really starting to get on my nerves. The other day I saw a social media post excoriating James Carville’s ideas about what Democrats should do and then saying something that I read as “oh, well, he’s 81 and gonna die soon anyway.”
I got the impression that the person who wrote just thought 81 was horribly old, not that they knew anything about Carville’s health.
Now I despise Carville. His ideas about what Democrats should do are awful; he’s the original “compromise with the Republicans no matter how extreme they get” person. I actually go to the trouble of cancelling political solicitations that mention his name, instead of just ignoring them. The Democrats made a major mistake by listening to him in the first place.
But he’s been wrong for at least 30 years, and probably longer. He thinks politics is a fucking game. After all, he’s married to a Republican consultant. Obviously he doesn’t think any of this is really vital – he just wants to win a game.
The problem isn’t that he’s old. It’s that he’s wrong. He’s always been wrong.
Each year, doctors treat more than 6 million bone fractures in the United States. And while it takes only a few seconds for a bone to break, the processes that keep your bones strong and allow them to heal are taking place continuously throughout your life.
Beneath their hard surface, your bones are alive with activity, continuously being broken down, rebuilt and reshaped. Far from being static structures that simply support the body, bones are dynamic, living tissues that respond to physical activity, hormones and the body’s changing needs.
I am a research scientist who studies bone biology and mineral metabolism. To me, one of the most striking things about bone is how dynamic it is, despite its static appearance. Research over the past 15 to 20 years has demonstrated that this is even more true than scientists had previously realized.
More than just structural support
For decades, scientists have known that bone provides support, stores minerals and continuously remodels itself. This remodeling is the process bone uses to renew itself, maintaining its strength while allowing the skeleton to adapt over time.
Different kinds of bone cells work together to maintain bone structure. Cells called osteoclasts remove old or damaged bone, while osteoblasts build new bone in its place. Osteocytes, which are cells embedded within bone, help sense mechanical strain and coordinate how bone responds. Together, these cells help the skeleton stay strong.
Your bones are constantly remodeling themselves to suit your body’s needs.
Lifelong support
The balance between bone formation and bone breakdown changes throughout life.
During childhood and adolescence, the body builds bone faster than it removes it, allowing bones to grow larger and denser. By early adulthood, most people reach their peak bone mass. After that, bone breakdown gradually begins to outpace bone formation, particularly with aging and hormonal changes. Over time, this shift can increase the risk of osteoporosis and fractures.
Bone is also highly responsive to how it is used. The skeleton is constantly “listening” to the demands placed upon it and adjusting accordingly. Everyday activities such as walking, running or lifting weights place stress on the skeleton. In response, bone adapts by becoming stronger. This is why weight-bearing and resistance exercises are so important for maintaining bone health.
On the other hand, prolonged inactivity due to illness, immobilization or a sedentary lifestyle can lead to bone loss. Astronauts also experience bone loss during spaceflight, but for a different reason: In microgravity, bones are lifting far less weight, even when astronauts remain physically active.
Communicating with the rest of the body
Hormones help regulate the process of bone formation and breakdown as well. Calcium and phosphate levels are tightly controlled by the body because they are essential for nerve signaling, muscle contraction and many other biological functions.
Bone serves as a major reservoir for these minerals. During menopause, a woman’s hormones shift and her body produces less estrogen, causing her bone density to decrease.
In addition to all of those functions, many bones contain bone marrow, the main site of blood cell production. Bone marrow produces red blood cells, which carry oxygen throughout the body; white blood cells, which help fight infection; and platelets, which are essential for blood clotting.
The marrow also responds to signals such as infection, inflammation and blood loss by adjusting blood cell production, making the skeleton closely connected to both the circulatory and immune systems.
Researchers have also found that bone not only receives signals from other organs, but it sends signals as well. Bone-derived molecules, including the protein osteocalcin, have been linked to energy metabolism and broader physiological signaling.
While scientists are still uncovering the full extent of these connections, growing evidence suggests that the skeleton is integrated with the rest of the body rather than functioning as an isolated structure.
Because bone is living tissue, it can also heal. After a fracture, the body moves through overlapping stages of repair that include inflammation, formation of new tissue and, later, remodeling of the repaired area.
Nutrition remains one of the practical foundations of bone health. Calcium is a major building block of bone, and vitamin D helps the body absorb calcium and maintain normal bone mineralization. Without enough of either, the skeleton has a harder time maintaining its structure and strength.
New approaches to bone research
These insights into how bone functions as a living tissue are beginning to reshape how researchers approach bone health.
Maintaining strong bones is not just about preventing fractures later in life. It is about supporting a living system that contributes to movement, mineral balance, blood cell production and communication with other tissues throughout the body every day.
