Not really. :D This is one of the T-shirts I was using when doing Submerged, then the rats did their part. I’m sure if I was enough of a pretentious twit, framed it, stuck it in a gallery, and made up a buncha twaddle about its significance, I could make good change off it. That won’t happen though. It’s gone back to the rats. Click for full size.
© C. Ford.
Mano Singham has a good post up about all the upset. As for me, this was my comment there:
I can’t get all that worked up about the cover. Is it nice to mock victims of a not so natural (climate change) disaster? No. Are there lots of people in Texas, who while they may not be outright nazis, share many a view with them? Probably. Is the United States swirling down the drain of fascism fair game? Yeah, I think it is. When you’re presenting a HUGE fucked-upness on the world stage, you have to learn to take it now and then, and before reacting, at least give yourself a few moments for thinking.
I gave two examples of people who consider themselves to be patriots, conservatives, and christian. They are pointing their minatory finger, and that of Jehovah straight at Texas, and all those victims of the flood. Oh yes, goddidit, and it’s all their fault. They are unabashedly placing the blame on the victims, and yet, not even a whimper of protest, let alone a roar. Until all those fine, outraged Americans find enough spine to spit in the face of their fellow christians hollering judgment, I think you should sit down and be quiet. Look to home, and deal with all the assholes and wannabe terrorists right here. They are everywhere, all around you. Try to have something to say about that.
ETA: Oh, we have another fine example! Texas Secretary of State Rolando Pablos (R-TX):
Quebec’s Minister of International Relations Christine St-Pierre called Pablos to express her sorrow and condolences on behalf of the people of the Canadian province. She also offered equipment and manpower.
Pablos turned it down. Instead he asked for “prayers from the people of Quebec,” the minister relayed.
Understandably, the neighbor to the north was shocked.
“It was a conversation about how devastating the situation is and we want to express our support to the people of Texas,” she told CBC News in an interview.
Isn’t that just splendid, Americans? Goodness, how those republicans do look after your best interests. We deserve every drop of fucking mockery directed our way. Via Raw Story.
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all our letters could be published in the future in a more enlightened time. Then all the world could see how in love we are.“
Peaches, cookie thief extraordinaire. Click for full size.
© C. Ford.
Rose. J.J. Grandville, Les fleurs animées.
I can’t get no sleep I can’t see the light I can’t stop the itch I can’t temporize
I can’t heal myself I can’t stop the greed I can’t sympathize I can’t love
So do you really want to change with me?
Come walk in my shoes for a little while
And sink in my pain
Come walk in my shoes for a little while
You’re welcome to my brain
Hear what I hear
See what I see
On My-Sick-Mind-TV
You don’t want to be me
I can’t rest in peace I can’t change the world I can’t stop the jolt I can’t say those words
I can be no good I can’t stop to scream I can bring you down I can’t smile
So do you really want to change with me?
(2x)
Come walk in my shoes for a little while
And sink in my pain
Come walk in my shoes for a little while
You’re welcome to my brain
Hear what I hear
See what I see
On My-Sick-Mind-TV
You don’t want to be me
(4x)
Come walk in my shoes for a little while
Watch My-Sick-Mind-TV!
From a calm Winter’s day to a breezy Spring day, from Lofty. Click for full size!
© Lofty, all rights reserved.
From Charly, click for full size!
© Charly, all rights reserved.
From Kestrel, more of the beautiful and dangerous Amanita muscaria, click for full size!
© Kestrel, all rights reserved.
Okay, got the head done, mostly. I shouldn’t be painting today, my mood…it’s not suitable. Clickety for full size.
© C. Ford, all rights reserved.
A group of “book women” on horseback in Hindman, Kentucky, 1940. Kentucky Library and Archives.
They were known as the “book women.” They would saddle up, usually at dawn, to pick their way along snowy hillsides and through muddy creeks with a simple goal: to deliver reading material to Kentucky’s isolated mountain communities.
The Pack Horse Library initiative was part of President Franklin Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration (WPA), created to help lift America out of the Great Depression, during which, by 1933, unemployment had risen to 40 percent in Appalachia. Roving horseback libraries weren’t entirely new to Kentucky, but this initiative was an opportunity to boost both employment and literacy at the same time.
“Sometimes the short way across is the hard way for the horse and rider but schedules have to be maintained if readers are not to be disappointed. Then, too, after highways are left, there is little choice of roads,” c. 1940. Kentucky Libraries and Archives.
Another fascinating article at Atlas Obscura, with absolutely splendid photos! Click on over and see.
Charles McGee, Unity. Photo by Sal Rodriguez. All images courtesy of Library Street Collective.
In 2014, when the City of Detroit threatened to sell many of the Detroit Institute of Art’s prized artworks to help the Motor City exit bankruptcy, the question of art’s role in the city’s future came front and center. Ultimately, the museum raised nearly a billion dollars to preserve the city’s cultural heritage—and its Picassos. Two years before, in what has become known as a “grand bargain,” local residents, husband and wife duo Anthony and JJ Curis, decided to open the Library Street Collective on a once-barren stretch of land. The Collective is a gallery with a traditional artist roster and a mission to revitalize the city by commissioning artists from the city and around the world to make public art in the streets of Detroit.
“Me or JJ don’t have an art background,” says Anthony Curis to Creators. “At the time, I was redeveloping a building in downtown Detroit that was meant to be a restaurant.” Back then, downtown Detroit’s state of near-total abandonment led him to open a gallery instead, at the suggestion of his wife. “The model wasn’t focused as much on the brick and mortar as it was on what kind of change we can make in the city.” He explains, “When we opened the gallery, we were really focused on public art and how could we change the landscape, making the community a little bit more vibrant and interesting. We are very interested in and keen on our mission to engage the public and reach people. That’s where the gallery was born.”
You can read much more, and see more about this project at The Creators Project.
Y’know, I don’t really see how this is different from noisy christian assholes saying ‘god’ was punishing Texas for having a gay mayor and allowing abortion. Yet that’s acceptable, and the mockery on the part of Hebdo isn’t.
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/kevin-swanson-hurricane-harvey-is-gods-judgment-on-houston-for-having-a-very-aggressively-pro-homosexual-mayor/
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/dave-daubenmire-hurricane-harvey-is-judgment-on-houston-for-abortion-and-having-had-a-lesbian-mayor/
They are saying it’s the victims’ fault, too. No one is yelling about that.