Here are links to my latest work, Daily Posts from the archives (June 2-6) in case you missed them, and articles, old and new, from around the internet. My aim is not to give you up to the minute news, but a historical understanding of our current times—too many people see everything going on as uniquely special to the current moment. You can follow me on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook (I am not accepting new friends on the last platform, but you can use the “follow” option).
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I wrote a new essay, “On AOC’s Endorsement of Mamdani, and Hope,” on the morning of June 5. I posted it, wondered if my pointing to the possibility of hope in these times might be proven silly and wrong, and then set about my tasks for the day. At some point, I took a nap, as is customary (my cats taught me well). I woke up a little while later to the news of the greatest bromance breakup of the century, between Elon Musk and Donald Trump. And just like that, as Carrie Bradshaw might say, the world was even more askew except that this time we can see some hope that the whole rotten enterprise might be breaking up.
But, it’s politics and massive amounts of money so, who knows? We’ve only just begun June, and it’s already been the longest year.
Speaking of June and all that: this has already been an incredibly tough couple of months for me and I anticipate that things will be stressful for a few more. I feel compelled to post this because people often ask me how I am, and I’m tired of pretending that everything is just fine. I have a lot to deal with and writing projects to finish, so, on occasion, these Updates may be light on links over the next few months. But writing is what keeps me alive and sane, and I will continue to produce new work every week. I have lots of essays on my burners, and am getting to all of them.
Onwards! Who knows what tomorrow will bring? Will we see a version of the famous fight scene in Bridget Jones’s Diary? Or will it be more like a reenactment at Medieval Times?
NEW WORK!
“On AOC’s Endorsement of Mamdani, and Hope.”
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FROM THE ARCHIVES!
Can it ever be Pride month without this classic? Here’s “Gay Marriage Hurts My Breasts.”
“Where the Gay Things Are,” in Current Affairs, on how we got here with gay marriage and all that terrible, horrible gay “organising.”
Every year, Teh Gayz insist that there is a controversy over kink at Pride, and there never is: it’s just them trying to pretend that they are still subversive and interesting. Here’s my “On Kink at Pride.”
Remember The Queen’s Gambit, and when we were all playing chess? Here’s my “Jolene, Jolene, Jolene: On Blackness in Queen’s Gambit.”
Covid denialism continues: here’s “Some of You Have Never Died, And It Shows.”
And here’s, “On Joe Biden and Covid.”
My “A Manifesto.”
“Missing: On Terror and Kidnappings,” with a short update to reflect that, perhaps, we can discern some hope.
“Inclusion in the Atrocious,” with Eli Massey, on trans inclusion in the military.
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ELSEWHERE ON THE WEB!
Many of us understood that creating deportation quotas for ICE “officials” to fulfil would mean an increase in state terror, and we witnessed some of that in Chicago this past week. People, including teenagers and children, are being lured to fake “hearings” and kidnapped; this is happening everywhere.
Bernie Sanders went to Ireland and refused to utter the g-word: the Irish were not having it.
The Democrats are, as usual, utterly useless. Some of them gathered in Washington for a “CPAC of the Centre,” and it was everything you might expect. The New York Times published a deliciously wry report, and it has one of the best opening sentences ever.
And, also in news about Democrats: they came up with the idea for “TACO Tuesday,” to mock Trump. Nathan J. Robinson points out that this is terrible messaging. But because they are Democrats, we will no doubt see more such in the years to come.
As we continue to insist that billionaires should help with everything from arts funding to infrastructure, here’s a 2021 reminder, from Bernard Freamon in Aeon, that slave societies in Persian Gulf cities exist. This is what a world owned by only the richest people is headed.
What are we fighting for? That’s the topic of a forthcoming essay, but, in the meantime, here is “As We Defend Medicaid, We Can’t Lose Sight of the End Goal: Free, Universal Care,” by Schuyler Mitchell, in Truthout.
Long Covid may be showing up in very young children, according to the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Here’s an article expanding on that research.
Tara Asgar and Nur A Mahjabin Khan write about feminism in Bangladesh, in an essay that complicates what we think of as feminism.
Manvir Singh’s new book Shamanism: The Timeless Religion, is in my to-read pile. He has an excerpt out in The Guardian, and you can also listen to an audio version here. Singh writes regularly for the New Yorker, and I’ve always enjoyed his work; I’m looking forward to the book, especially because I grew up around some of the people he describes here.
Lesbians are constantly being erased from queer history, so this, about the Lesbian Herstory Archives in Brooklyn, is a joy to read.
This is from last year, but it’s always worth remembering the late queer activist John Preston whose life and work remind us that “queer” exists outside big cities.
Karen Carpenter had an exquisite and unreal voice, but she could also play the drums—really, really well.
“It’s Summertime,” by Mungo Jerry. Listen, we have to keep hope alive, even in 50 degree temperatures.
Here’s Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem.” (“There is a crack, a crack in everything/That’s how the light gets in…”)
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You can find previous Updates here.
Take naps, lots of them: these are strange times, and we need our rest. I will see you next week.
Image: Agnes Martin, Mid Winter, c. 1954
