Dear Liberal White teachers,

January 8, 2021January 11, 2021booktoss 2 Comments

I work with you. I watch you. I read what you say and I see what you do. I’ve seen how you are reacting and what you are teaching following the attempted coup of 2021. I have some notes for you ….

I need you to stop waiting to be ready. You are not ready. You will never be ready. But you need to act to interrupt Whiteness’s hold on education. I am using Whiteness in the spirit Dr. Debbie Reese used it in her 2019 Arbuthnot lecture as a stand-in for an oppressive and normed expectation that White, male, straight, cis, able, Christian, English speaking, and middle class are that which everything else is measured against (https://pbswisconsin.org/wpt-education-livestream/).

You will screw up. You will do damage. You will be criticized. Welcome to the world, now get on with it.

You will NOT be perfect. You will NOT receive cookies or badges or rewards of any kind for being brave. And, you need to act anyway.

DECENTERING WHITENESS

Using “I” statements won’t divorce you from your community, history, and culpability. The world we are living in is your world. It was created for you. This is America, it is your America and avoiding this reality does not help anyone or anything except you. Your need to avoid “conflict” is actually a way to avoid change. Your need to avoid the discomfort of the history of racism and other forms of oppression, as well as current events is an issue for you to deal with.

You need to work on that. You, as an adult and as a teacher need to learn how to engage in conversation that YOU are not ready for because the kids in your class are ready. They need a place to talk through, to look at, to digest and think about their world.

Your avoidance is protecting you from your own discomfort. Avoiding conversations with your students is a selfish, self-indulgent act.

Read that again.

You are the adult in the room and your students are looking and listening to you for clues on how to move forward. They know if you are open to discussions, they hear your hesitancy and the hopeful avoidance in your questions. It is your responsibility to be an adult and take control of your learning. The fact that you have not been listening, reading, watching, hearing anyone besides White, male, Christian, able, straight, English speaking people for your entire adult life is no one else’s fault. Take responsibility for your own action and inactions.

Did you read that copy of White Fragility you absolutely had to have?

Did you read that copy of How to be an Antiracist you absolutely had to have?

Did you read that copy of So You Want to Talk About Race you absolutely had to have?

If you read those books or any of the others that were trending over the summer, did you work to understand them? If you read White Rage that would have helped you understand what you saw this week. Are you ready to apply this fragile knowledge in your classrooms?

No?

That is a YOU problem and you need to fix it because Whiteness loves to protect itself with perfection.

CENTER BIPOC KNOWLEDGE

If you had been listening to BIPOC folks and believing us, you would find the attempted coup COMPLETELY believable. Because we have been telling you for literally centuries that Whiteness is a dangerous and violent colonizing force. Whiteness keeps showing up cloaked in blood and you keep being surprised.

I Give Up GIFs | Tenor — Insert your own pithy metaphor here. I do not have it in me right now.

The current president and his White supremacist fan base have been 100% truthful with you the entire time. Their messages aren’t subtle but your inability to comprehend is your responsibility. If you want to center yourself, center your need to comprehend and act on what we have been telling you, what you have been avoiding. Center your inaction.

You should NOT be surprised by the fact that your Trump supporting friend, relative, colleague, neighbor is a racist, homophobic, anti-mask, COVID denying asshat. Your surprise is a way of denying, of turning away from, and protecting you. Being surprised is about you and your actions. It isn’t about the world, because the world isn’t really all that surprising most of the time. Again, White supremacists have LITERALLY been telling us what and when they were going to attempt a coup.

You might not like it, but stop saying you are surprised. You need to be asking yourself why you keep thinking that the Trump supporting racist, homophobic, anti-mask, COVID denying asshat is STILL a “good person”. When is the line of goodness breached?

And, a word on Stacey Abrams … White America loves a lone wolf hero, a single savior but that isn’t how social justice movements work. We spend the time to build coalitions and partnerships. We work like hell all the time. We provide back-up for each other and lift each other up, call each other out, and learn from each other. Read Ishena Robinson’s excellent piece from The ROOT – Stacey Abrams Is Not Your Superhero, Mule or God.

WHAT NOT TO DO

Stop “protecting the children”. You aren’t. You are perpetuating Whiteness and you are protecting Whiteness. You are protecting your place in oppressive systems and your own comfort.

Stop being “exhausted”. All you all White people need to buck the fuck up and figure out what you are going to DO about this mess. And then DO something. Whiteness always wants to protect itself but does not give a holy hot kitten about the oppressive violence it causes.

Stop denying. If you find yourself saying “this is not America” or “this is not who we are” just shut up.

Stop “all lives mattering” or “what about riots in black and brown neighborhoods” bullshit. I’m not even going to explain this to you.

Stop asking BIPOC people in your life to be patient and help you without putting in some damn work.

WHAT TO DO

Take a deep breath and say “this is my America. How can we change it?”

Take charge of your own learning. Look up definitions! Start with “False equivalency” and “gaslighting”.

Look for resources produced and authored by BIPOC women. I am not going to give you a link. Do some damn work.

Consume BIPOC media, especially books, movies, podcasts produced and authored by BIPOC women.

Recommend BIPOC media, especially the material produced and authored by BIPOC women to your White peers and colleagues.

Believe BIPOC women.

Schrödinger’s Ballot Box

November 3, 2020November 4, 2020booktoss 2 Comments

I haven’t slept well or much in the last few months.
I’m not ok. Not even close to it.
This country isn’t ok either.
This country hasn’t been ok for a large swath of people since the beginning. This country was build on stolen land, using stolen people, by White men and women who knew exactly what they were doing. These Europeans set this country in motion and here we are riding that same wave.

We are experiencing a Schrödinger’s Cat-type situation with this election. Schrödinger’s Cat is a way of thinking about two opposing realities that exist as two wave forms collapsing into each other, thus creating what we experience as reality. There is some other stuff about it, but right now this election is Schrödinger’s Cat thing – where we are both re-electing and not reelecting the worst president and white house in modern day history. This cat is kicking my ass.

Internet meme, SNL parody. Everything to know about the Oakland BBQ saga - The San Diego Union-Tribune

For those who are White, or male, or straight, or cis, or Christian, or middle class, or able, or who are holding tight to those adjacent spaces, folks need to be ready for change. It is going to be scary, because reality and history is going to be challenged. The status quo is built to exclude far too many to stay intact.

I’m writing to the folks who have been awakened in the past 4 years, 2 years, or 6 months. Whatever happens when the ballot boxes are opened and our reality is revealed the oppressive practices will not change. This presidency didn’t invent oppression and the end of this presidency won’t end it either.

This presidency didn’t create Amy Cooper, Jennifer Schulte, Carolyn Bryant. Our support of Whiteness and these women’s faith in that protection created a space for them to weaponize their tears, until it didn’t. Our unerring support of Whiteness must be recognized, challenged and changed.

This presidency didn’t create Henry Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, R Kelly, or Brock Turner. Our support of patriarchal ideals protect these men, until it doesn’t and then we are shocked – SHOCKED – about how long their behavior went on. Our unerring support of toxic masculinity must be recognized, challenged and changed.

Philly's Pride Flag to Get Two New Stripes: Black and Brown

Stonewall, Matthew Sheppard, and the Pulse nightclub massacre, and the trans women who are the MOST likely to be assaulted are not solely about this presidency. These hate crimes happen because of deep-seated and long standing hatred against LGBTQIA people. This kind of loathing must be recognized, challenged and changed everyday until the FACT of our existence is no longer controversial.

This presidency didn’t invent oppression. But, the current office holder has given a bullhorn of authoritarian voice to these deeply held convictions of White, male, cis, english speaking, middle class, Christian, able, and straight supremacy. Our country has always been divided between “us” and “them” and this president and his white house have gleefully pushed the narrative that marginalized people and communities are dangerous and are to blame for all the ills of the world – real and imagined.

So, what are you going to do about that when the dust settles?

How are you going to work to learn and unlearn and teach your family, your students, or your colleagues to see and read in new ways?

For all those White women who reached out to me and other BIPoC scholars to start book groups, what are you going to do? If Biden wins, are you going to settle back into your willful ignorance? Are you going to chose your comfort? Or, are you going to keep learning the hidden history that has been kept from you?

What are you going to do to change everything from gun laws, to voting laws, school dress codes, high stakes testing, and curriculum?

Janelle Monae addresses us all when she sings “We kicking out the old regime / Liberation, elevation, education / I said ‘America, yousa lie’ / But the whole world ’bout to testify,”

No matter what happens tonight, tomorrow, or next week, we must engage in dismantling oppressive systems and ideas. No matter which of the wave forms collapses into non-reality and which one solidifies, The Work will go on because it isn’t about one man.

Blackall’s Bland as Blah …

September 13, 2020booktoss 4 Comments

I do not want to spend my Sunday writing about another problematic picture book or graphic novel. I want authors and illustrators to learn the very basics is Critical Race Theory and visual literacy and put those two things to work … together.

But, this is 2020 and CLEARLY I am not going to get what I want. That is the overwhelming message of this year. Not getting what we want is also the theme of much of mainstream children’s publishing.

So, here we are. Sunday night, 8:00 pm, middle of September and I am writing a response to the people – teachers, parents and past students – who have asked me about Sophie Blackall’s close to be released book If You Come To Earth. Publishers Weekly has given it a starred review (read their review here, I’ll wait) …. and there is lots of “oh, it’s so wonderful to see such diversity …”

The whole thing makes me want to hold my head.

Look.

People.

I cannot say this any clearer. Literally.

We, as a society, are marinating in oppressive views of the world that uphold a warped view of what is normal and anyone who exists outside that normed standard is marginalized.

Because we are marinating in this oppressive, warped view of normal, it means we all need to push and struggle against the assumed norm. That’s it. That is the The Work.

So, when I took a look at Blackall’s book, that is what I was looking for – affirmation of the assumed norm is good and everything else is bad or suspect or less. That is how I read everything! And, in this case, I look carefully at the images and what messages the images convey about marginalized people and communities.

I am going to take you through one image from Blackall’s book. This is from the middle … a double page spread of families at a park. At first glance it seems that lots of folks are represented.

But let’s look at the WAY they are represented …. and for this you have to dog into the parts of our cultural views of marginalized communities that we don’t want to admit to in polite society – but these are the messages that go unrecognized, and therefore, unchallenged.

In the upper left corner there is an African American woman … she is pregnant and has 4 kids around here. Now, remember the page is about families, and in the US, that most often means a nuclear family.

What do you notice? She is Black, has lots of kids, she’s pregnant, and no partner is anywhere in sight.

What is the common and racist stereotype about Black women in America?

yup.

Let’s look at this woman in a head covering and her daughter. Again, no partner. But, she’s not Black. I read her as some random Muslim of no particular region, race, or ethnicity. But, the anti-Islamic stereotype in American is that all Islamic men are terrorists and at war. So, where is her partner?

And, please note there is one other large family at the lower right corner. Probably Jewish orthodox of some sort. The girls are quietly drawing while the boys are actively playing.

I can’t.

I’m tired. I don’t want to address the reification of so many visual stereotypes on one page.

And before you at me – yeah. There are a couple of gay men with kids (again a 2 parent household). There is an intergenerational family, and a childless couple. My issue is with the unchallenged stereotypes that Black women have big families without stable male partners. My issue is with the missing Muslim dad. My issue is with the Jewish orthodox boys that are physically active and sedate girls.

Puppy Gifofdogs GIF by Rover.com - Find & Share on GIPHY

So, here I am, 10:30pm on a Sunday night, in what is probably the worst year in history of years, reading a picture book that reminds me of the “multicultural melting pot” books of the 80s. It reminds me that unchallenged stereotypes set expectations for young readers. It reminds me that I’m tired and I want publishing to get better at seeing this crap before they send a book to press. I’m tired of reviewers ignoring or not seeing these oppressive tropes.

Erasure by Any Other Name …

June 4, 2019June 28, 2019booktoss 12 Comments

June in Pride Month and I’m a long-time Latinx lesbian and we’ve got some history to cover. I’ve been out for the majority of my life. I’m out to friends, family, acquaintances, neighbors, colleagues, students, my sons’ friends and families, the checkout people at the grocery store, all the contractors I try and get to come back to the house to actually do the work that we’d like to pay them for, and our dog. I’m even out to the Subaru dealership guys – although that not a shock to anyone.

In fact, I’m about as out as I can be and this is a focused, calculated act of defiance and activism. We are enmeshed in a homophobic, racist, sexist, ablest, classist society that is staunchly in favor of and designed to support and affirm a White, male, able, middle-class, Christian, straight ideal.

What is sometimes most distressing is how people who are privilege adjacent align themselves with the dominant group instead of lifting up communities that are oppressed and minoritized. I define privilege adjacent as someone who is one degree removed from the idealized White, male, able, middle class, Christian, straight idealized identity. When I address identity I am referring to the ways Dr. Beverly Tatum talks about it in The complexity of identity: Who am I in which she specifies “race or ethnicity, gender, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, age, and physical or mental ability”.

This kind of privilege adjacent behavior is seen in the racism enacted by White feminists when they uphold and protect Whiteness. It is seen in the ways Latinx men vote for White male candidates thus upholding maleness. And, it is seen in the LGBTQIA community’s racism, sexism, and transphobia. The White LGBTQIA community often actively erases, omits, disregards and generally tosses under the bus BIPOC people across the spectrum, including but not limited to bi- and pan-sexual people, as well as gender outlaws (Kate Bornstein, 1994/2010/2016) which include trans, gender fluid and everyone else not accounted for on the imagined and idealized gender binary.

The LGBTQIA community has a lot to learn and repair. I was hoping some of that education and repair work would be seen in Stonewall: A Building. An Uprising. A Revolution by Rob Sanders and Jamey Christoph (Random House, 2019).

But, no. This isn’t the book to do that work. Instead, it is yet another fiction that provides a gay, White, cis, straight appealing, male community a pat on the back. Instead of lifting- up the trans women of color, and the butch women and femme men who were at the forefront of the riots, this book presents a more palatable image.

The author and illustrator decided to enter into the story of the Stonewall riots using the buildings as the narrators. The personified buildings provide a brief history of Greenwich Village from the 1840s when the area was used to board horses, through an unknown time of immigration, taking a dip into the 1930s with artists, and finally landing on “gays and lesbians. They were men who loved men, and women who loved women” in the 1960s (p.11). This is the first, but certainly not the last opportunity that the authors take to enforce a strict gender binary. The men are masculine appealing in a sort of Abercrombie & Fitch metro-sexual way, whereas the women remind me of Marlo Thomas from That Girl!

On the next page (p. 13-14) there might be a Black trans woman or maybe a drag queen embraced by a young White man. She is centered and surrounded by a sea of Whiteness. Again, the authors choose to use “gay” as an all encompassing word.

On page 19-20 the issue of unjust laws begins, and the text states that the police “stormed through our doors, lining up the men and women inside, demanding IDs, detaining some, arresting others.” The text doesn’t hint at, allude to, show or address the beatings, bribes, or all the other corruption and violence that the police perpetuated during that time (and continue today).

Finally, on pages 21 and 22, the text reads ” ‘Why don’t you do something?’ yelled one woman as she was forced into a police car.” The illustration is a short, thin, wasp waisted woman with brown hair wearing a v-neck t-shirt, in handcuffs, getting into a police car.

Not a lot of folks have a clear understanding or recollection of what happened that night in 1969. They were busy making history. I know this, when I lived in San Francisco during the late 80s I heard about Stonewall from LGBTQIA elders who were there (or claimed to be) while I stuffed envelopes, folded quilts, and sat around bars having brunch. I always heard about two Black women … Stormé DeLarverie and Marsha P. Johnson as the grandmothers of the gay rights movement. (Full disclosure, I never knew Stormé’s last name until I started researching for this review).

Stormé DeLarverie was a bi-racial stone butch from Louisiana. She performed in nightclubs and worked as a bouncer. She was not petite or slight, and she sure as hell wasn’t wasp waisted and cooperative. According to Julia Robertson’s HuffPost article “She was androgynous, tall, dark, handsome and legally armed.” She got tired of taking punches, so she literally fought back that night.

Marsha P. Johnson a “trans activist” according to Julia Jacobs’ NY Times article. Marsha and Sylvia Rivera (HOW DID I NOT KNOW ABOUT HER!?!?!?) have also been credited with throwing the first bricks of the riot. Again, both of these women are women of color and both are missing from this book. (That isn’t exactly true. There is one photograph included in the back matter that shows these two powerful trans women of color sharing an umbrella during a protest.)

After the police car pages where the book either erases or misrepresents Stormé, and blithely moves on to capture a very #AllGaysMatter sort of vibe. But, according to many articles, as well as the folks I talked to way back in the 80s, that wasn’t the case. The people leading the fight were lesbians, especially butch lesbians, drag queens, and trans men and women. Many, not all, were BIPOC. These were the people who were there to protect, to rise up, and to start the revolution that lead the way for me to live as an out Latinx lesbian with a life partner, two kids, a dog and a literal picket fence.

History is White-, straight-, and male-washed in the country. Even LGBTQIA history is written to actively erase the contributions of people of color, trans, bi, butch and femme in favor of a more palatable White, heteronormative mimicry. Stonewall: A Building. An Uprising. A Revolution by Rob Sanders and Jamey Christoph (Random House, 2019) falls into that same trap.

This is the beginning of PRIDE. Learn some history. Think about the voices you hear over and over and who is missing. Stormé, Marsha, and Sylvia deserve to be known and celebrated for being the truly badass women they were. I hope they get the picturebook they deserve, but this is not that book.

An author’s response

June 6, 2019 at 12:41 pm Rob Sanders replied using the comment option :

As the author of the first picture book on the subject of the Stonewall Uprising, I was careful not to tell any one story from the Uprising–and there are as many stories as there are people who were present, each true and authentic. Rather, I chose to tell the story of the buildings that came to be known as the Stonewall Inn so children for the first time ever could hear and read about the history of the Uprising. The book was vetted by eight diverse members of the LGBTQ community. The illustrations of the book show a cross-section of the LGBTQ community who were present at the Stonewall Inn and who took place in the Uprising. The back matter is careful to point out with words and photos that trans women of color had an important role in the Uprising. One book never can represent all the aspects of a historic event, nor can one author. It was my sincere hope when I wrote this book and today that this is the first of many books on the subject of the Stonewall Uprising and that people who can tell the stories of individuals who were present at the Uprising will tell those stories with their strong, authentic voices.

My Response, June 8, 2019 11:41 pM

I needed to delay my response to the authors comments for a few reasons, including but not limited to the fact that I have other work, family, dog, and BBQ obligations. I was frustrated by the Mr. Sanders response. Frustrated, but not surprised.

Mr. Sanders writes that he was “careful not to tell any one story” but that is exactly what this book does. By omitting and avoiding “any one person” he and the illustrator have, once again, erased the actual women responsible for raising their voices and sparking the riots.

The author says “The book was vetted by eight diverse members of the LGBTQ community.” And that may be true, but I have questions about this vetting process. Were these people friends and family? Were these readers children’s literature scholars that focus on representation of mis- and under-represented communities? Were the paid sensitivity readers? Were the recommendations given in a transparent manner, such as, “This erases Black and Latinx trans women as main actors in the movement.” Were the recommendations given to the illustrator? Were the recommendations followed or put aside as too troublesome or unimportant?

Mr. Sanders is both proud that this is the first picturebook and defensive that not every book can be everything. I’m not asking for it to be everything. I am critiquing the active erasure of BOIPOC women. This defense that not all books can be everything is all too familiar. Black/Indigenous/People of Color are always told to wait. We are unwilling to wait any longer. The erasure of names and identities in the LGBTQIA community in favor of a White hetero-palatable, woman is an action.

These creative choices continue a long standing tradition of erasure of BIPOC people from history. It continues the erasure of trans and butch women from LGBTQIA history. White is not neutral. Hetero-normative is not neutral. None of the choices made by the author, illustrator, editor, and publisher are neutral.

References

Bornstein, K., & Bergman, S. B. (2010). Gender outlaws: The next generation. Seal Press.

Jacobs, J. (2019). Two Transgender Activists Are Getting a Monument in New York. New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/29/arts/transgender-monument-stonewall.html

Robertson, J. D., & ContributorAuthor. (2017, June 4). Remembering Stormé – The Woman Of Color Who Incited The Stonewall Revolution. HuffPost. Retrieved from https://www.huffpost.com/entry/remembering-stormé-the-woman-who-incited-the-stonewall_b_5933c061e4b062a6ac0ad09e

Tatum, B. D. (2000). The complexity of identity: Who am I. Readings for diversity and social justice, 2, 5-8.

I welcome your comments.
Please know I will not publish or respond to anonymous comments.

Muted but Not Silenced

May 2, 2019May 3, 2019booktoss 8 Comments

The last piece I wrote for this blog – my blog – was titled “Harshly” Judging Islamophobia. In it I called out Jack Gantos’s graphic novel A Suicide Bomber Sits in the Library for being racist and anti-Muslim.

My critique wasn’t unique. It was fairly standard fare as these days go. In fact, my reaction was echoed by many others – approximately 1092 others in fact! We all signed an open letter from the Asian Author Alliance addressed to the publisher, Abrams. I was one of the signatories to the letter and was relieved to see the resulting response from the publisher that they pulled the book. Abrams also did the usual “offense felt by” rhetorical move that put the blame on those who were offended and not on the offending parties. Again, nothing new; nothing out of the ordinary; nothing to break stride over.

And then I was on to the next book, the next idea, the next article, the next class. I think I was finally going to get around to writing about Laurie Halse Anderson and Emily Carroll’s haunting, painful, beautiful graphic novel adaptation of Speak. It is a truly amazing and provides a new way for readers to connect with, bear witness, and see themselves through trauma and survival of sexual assault.

I love writing about books I think kids deserve. They might love a book because it holds surprises for them; or because it reflects them in ways that they have never seen before; provides them respite from their everyday lives; or shows them things they never knew or imagined. All of that was sorely lacking from my own literary history. And, again, I am not unique in this history. Marginalized communities do not have a body of children’s literature that reflects the varied experiences, histories, or imagined futures that privilege provides.

That is why I am a proud member of the #DiversityJedi, a close knit, loosely organized, geographically diffuse group of teachers, scholars, and librarians who engage in critical literary analysis of children’s and YA literature. We support children’s and YA literature that disrupts the assumed supremacy of White, straight, able, cis, maleness.

And that brings me back to A Suicide Bomber Sits in the Library, one of the most overtly racist graphic novels I’ve read in recent years. Lots of White folks celebrated, then defended the book (some without reading it, some after reading it). Many White folks defended the author, claiming that he was the real victim of yet another “Twitter mob”. Many left comments on my blog or on Twitter decrying CENSORSHIP!; WHAT’S NEXT? BOOK BURNING!; REVERSE RACISM!! and lots of THIS IS WHAT IS WRONG WITH SOCIAL MEDIA. Again, all this has become very run-of-the-mill for me and for the other #DiversityJedi.

And then I got a letter, and actual piece of snail mail, delivered to my university mail box. It was a normal day in academia – I was rushing from here to there and stopped to grab the catalogues, flyers, and announcements that had built up in my mailbox. I also grabbed that envelope that contained a hate filled death threat.

WARNING – references to sexual assault and violence
You can scroll down until you see a cat giving you a thumbs up

“Wait, what?” you might be saying. And, I don’t blame you, because that’s what I said as I stood on the sidewalk, backpack falling off my shoulder, a single piece of white paper dripping with violence directed squarely at me or at my online persona, Dr. Booktoss. The writer was angry and bitter and really, really violent. His grievance was that I had attacked a White author instead of going after the “murdering muslims” who deserve to be killed in horrible ways. He accused me of being an ISIS operative. He was angered by the fact that I was and had in my possession a “fucking dyke cunt” and I was a traitor to my country. He suggested I volunteer as a sex slave for ISIS, if they would even touch me, so they could fuck me in every hole until they were tired of me, and then they could cut off my tits and my head and post the video on YouTube. (The letter is worse.)

The letter stunned me. It stopped me cold as I stood on the street and for months since I have been stuck in that moment. My university has been great and taken many steps to make sure I am safe, but I do not feel safe. The fact that someone wants me to die in such horrible ways sticks with me, even as I write this. The chances that anything will happen are slim, but not none. There is a proliferation of hate, guns, and fear in this country that I cannot ignore.

I thought this was unique. But, it turns out it really isn’t. Many of us who do this work – urging authors, editors and publishers to avoid lazy tropes that rely on racism, sexism ableism, and homophobia, as well as educate teachers and librarians to be critically conscious about the literature they provide to students – we receive hate mail and vilent threats. I had become used to the hate. After all, I’m an out Latinx lesbian who confronts and openly wants to disrupt the status quo of our society. I’ve gotten used to people disagreeing with me, defending themselves, accusing me of being a bully, or the real racist, or simply being too sensitive, rude and uncivilized.

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http://afropunk.com/tag/bbq/

So have many of the #DiversityJedi who are also women of color – Indigenous, Black, Latinx, Asian, Middle Eastern and so many more – who speak out against the assumed supremacy of unearned privilege. And, so many of us have been and continue to be threatened and harassed. We make jokes, we send each other memes and words of encouragement. Is it a surprise that this treatment has simply become part of our normal? Look at the society we are raised in! We are, literally, trained to take abuse in silence.

Not many of us talk about the hatred and harassment. One #DiversityJedi I talked to about the threats said, “you are like me. You only want them to see your strength”. We, as a group, don’t write about the public confrontations, emails, unposted comments, DMs, and letters that threaten our integrity, our jobs, and our lives. Instead, we stand, shoulders back and take it, trying not to show our fear, our anger, our vulnerability, and our exhaustion, and then we move on to the next.

END OF WARNING

Recently, Carole Lindstrom spoke out via social media about an especially egregious confrontation she had at the Children’s Book Guild of Washington DC. Dr. Debbie Reese has an account of the events and continuing fall-out here on her blog, A Chronological Look at Events Launched by Harassment on April 11 at the Children’s Book Guild of Washington DC. Carole Lindstrom spoke out. She had the courage to say STOP, listen, this happened and it is unacceptable – she is my #DiversityJedi hero.

I am trying to get up, trying to find my way back to writing. I am trying to navigate the fear and anger and temptation to be silent and ashamed in my fear. There are a few things that are helping –

The support of my partner, my close friends and colleagues and my university.
The un-questioning support of the #DiversityJedi.
The students, all of them, that are affected by this work. The kids in classrooms and libraries who need to learn, to think, and to feel centered and seen instead of being told to shut up and take it. Especially, these bad-ass kids who are writing in honor of their friend, Indigo’s Bookshelf.
The teachers in the classes I teach. They are truly doing the work of finding the cracks in a system not built for humans, and making it humane.
Ice cream. Lots of really good ice cream.

And so, I’m going to follow in the footsteps of those who have been brave before me and I will continue to speak, continue to push, and continue to educate because nothing will ever change if we allow ourselves to be silent.

This blog post is part of the #31DaysIBPOC Blog Challenge, a month-long movement to feature the voices of indigenous and teachers of color as writers and scholars. Please CLICK HERE to read yesterday’s blog post by Dr. Liza Talusan (and be sure to check out the link at the end of each post to catch up on the rest of the blog circle).

“Harshly” Judging Islamophobia

January 2, 2019January 3, 2019booktoss 13 Comments

On November 23, 2018, AKA Black Friday, I was just sort of poodle-ing around FaceBook. You know, what I mean by poodle-ing, right? I was actively avoiding going anywhere near the malls by re-watching episodes of The Good Place for the 3rd time, and considering the wisdom of my pie to whipped cream ratio.

Judging a Book by It’s Cover

So, there I sat, looking at pictures of food and family gatherings, thinking about gifts, getting addresses for holiday cards, watching TV, cuddling my judgmental dog, and catching up on FaceBook posts. I have semi-left/am trying to ween myself from FaceBook and failing miserably so I end up reading lots of stuff all at once.

During my binge FB reading I saw long time children’s book champion, Teri Lesesne’s (AKA Professor Nana) October 10, 2018 public post about a new graphic novel by Jack Gantos. What caught my eye was the sheer incongruity between the title, A Suicide Bomber Sits in the Library, the cover image (provided), and the immediate praise for the book, “is a work of art.” I hoped I was misreading something – the dissonance was jarring. And then I read further … “art of language accompanied by art of illustration. Combined in one spare tale, it will leave readers stunned, off kilter, maybe even a bit dizzy as they turn the page, the page that also turns them. Jack Gantos and Dave McKean have created a story of hate and redemption.

I found a few pages on the publisher’s website. I was struck by the abhorrent and racist representation of this unnamed, random “muslim”, young male protagonist. And, when I say unnamed I mean he is LITERALLY called “The suicide bomber” – like that’s his damn name. And, he’s supposed to be it a boy … and I use that term only because that is what the author claims … but he looks like a caricature of angry old man. The skin tones used in the book are pretty terrible – a sort of gray/tan/khaki color that is the same as the shirts and pants various characters wear.

Stories matter. If you are reading this, chances are you believe that. And if you believe that stories matter, you have got to begin to recognize that when a boy gets no identity except male, muslim, and terrorist, that it matters.

Letter from the Asian Author Alliance

After receiving feedback from many in the #kidlit field, including an open letter from the Asian Author Alliance (read the letter here, and the followup here) Abrams pulled the book. I’m not going to thank Abrams because HOW DID THIS THING GET PUBLISHED in the first place?

It is clear that the author, Jack Gantos, has no idea what the problem is as he continues to not listen to anyone but himself. Benjamin Doxtdator wrote a brilliant post about his experience of Gantos visiting his class here – Fact-Checking Jack Gantos. I think it is telling, and all too common, that Gatos has publicly reacted in surprise, defense, and frustration. Doxtdator writes, “Gantos said that he was “shouted down” by an “online mob”, and now that he has been told to “stay in his lane”, he would “retreat” to his “white boy dog house.” His words make it clear that either he not understand, does not recognize, or simply does not care that he has contributed to a frighteningly large pile of racist tropes that portrays Muslim males as nothing more than terrorists.

The racist genesis of this book is important for me to point out. According to Gantos he was sitting in the Boston Public Library (BPL), a library I am intimately familiar with and love. is always something happening; kids, teens, and adults constantly coming and going with books, using computers, having meetings, and meeting up. I work there a few times a month and consider it to be my library – I take ownership of the space when I am there and pay attention to the patrons and librarians. So, I can well imagine the scene Gantos describes in the author’s note;

Just then a boy’s cell phone went off. I turned and looked at him. He was wearing a red jacket. He was not holding a book. Instead, he reached into his pocked and pulled out a cell phone. He held it to his ear and did not speak. He nodded his head in agreement, then he stood up and quickly left the room through the doorway where overhead a paining of the Muse of Inspiration holds lightening bolts in his hands. One of these bolts struck me and I put my head down and wrote ‘A Suicide Bomber Sits in the Library’.

So, there it is. A White, male, adult saw a kid, who he perceived was not White, take a call and walk out of the library. I have no doubt the scene took place exactly as Gantos remembers it. It is a scene I have witnessed innumerable times at that library. But, the inspiration was not the kid, or the painting. The inspiration was his own bigotry, fear, and xenophobia.

On Piling On

Back on Facebook, I read Teri Lesesne’s public post, and the comments about the book pile up. Maybe not surprising, the comments were overwhelmingly positive and completely lacking in any critical pushback. The commenters were a children’s literature scholars, authors, teachers, and librarians.

I also checked Twitter, because in my experience Twitter is more likely to be the space where Critical Race Theory and other Social Justice oriented lenses are put into practice. So I searched #ASuicideBomberSitsintheLibrary and, yes, folks on facebook might have been celebrating the “captivating” story that was “amazing” them, but Twitter was having none of it. The first critical Tweet I read – and I am not saying it was THE first but it was the first one I saw, was from Heba Y. Amin (Twitter thread);

Two white guys write a book about a Middle-Eastern-ish suicide bomber CHILD?! in a non-descript Middle Eastern land?! in children’s book form?! masked as a lesson in reason and compassion?! I’m so dumbfounded by this.

She linked the preview from the publisher which clearly shows it is being published with children in mind.

Back to FaceBook and I see Dr. Debbie Reese (@debreese) interrupted the cheer-fest that was occurring, “Don’t know if anyone in this thread gave a thought to how this book would land with others, but it is not going well at the moment (Nov 22, 2018).” I added a comment directing readers toward Twitter. Alyson Beecher (@alysonbeecher) stated, “I did see that thread and for that reason I have similar concerns.”

Sarah Hamburg (@sarahrhamburg) pointed directly to the damage these kinds of characters and stories do in the real world,

Debbie Reese posted more from the publisher. Jillian Heise (@heisereads) posted the letter from Asian Author Alliance. Melinda R. Cordell (@rosefiend ) and Melanie Hope Greenberg (I’m not sure if she is on Twitter) both voices concern for the effect on actual kids by this book.

Then, in what I interpreted as a last ditch effort to save face for the author, Leslie Bermel (@Uryrwrds) asked, “You all do know the author is on this thread, right?” I asked how that changes the conversation and her response was “Doesn’t seem like a conversation anymore.” What surprised me was the “anymore“. Like, when it was accolades and flowers uncritically thrown at the feet of Jack Gantos, it was a conversation. But, when it changed to highlighting critical voices, then it was no longer a conversation. Why is that?

What Might 2019 Bring?

Again, the publisher pulled the book. Which is good. But, this is going to happen again and again and again unless we, as a community, learn to recognize characters and stories that are based in long held privilege and strive to erase those depictions. That’s one of the problems – these depictions are familiar to those privileged gatekeepers – like the first responders to the FactBook post. The initial look at that cover, the title, and the story was familiar and so it felt true, and interesting and amazing to those readers who were predominantly White and all non-muslim.

Publishing is a business. There is no reason for that business to change as long as participating in familiar ways is rewarded. And publishers are rewarded by book people – librarians, teachers. scholars, and researchers – buying and recommending books.

That is the power of social media. There are more and more people becoming book people and letting publishers know we are here. We, those who are NOT represented by the imagined norm of White, straight, male, able, cis, middle class representation – are here. We are readers, we are teachers, we are librarians, we are scholars and we will continue to speak, even if when our voices shake. We will stand together and we will insist on a wider array of authentic representations from the literary world than the one we grew up with because we know stories matter.

Stories matter.

Trans People Aren’t Mythical Creatures

September 24, 2018September 25, 2018booktoss 20 Comments

In research we often provide what is referred to as a positionality statement. It helps our readers understand who we are, how our experiences and identities effect our understandings of the subject we are writing about. Positionality statements help avoid the fiction that research is neutral. In the age of #OwnVoices I have come to realize, or maybe I have come to admit to the realization, that I believe an author’s identity, community, and experiences informs the work they produce.

Librarian Angie Manfredi (@misskubelik ), Tweeted out about a book she wasn’t crazy about. Here is a link to the entire thread. “Our library copy of JULIAN IS A MERMAID has finally arrived and it is adorable but I NEED everyone in #kidlit to acknowledge it would NOT be getting this amount of love and attention if it were written by a gender non-conforming queer IPOC – it might not even have been published.” The book was written and illustrated by Jessica Love, a White, cis, woman.

For a long time I hesitated to write about Julián, a picturebook is about a boy who dreams of being a mermaid, transforms himself, and his abuela who upon seeing him dressed in a headpiece and flowing train, takes him to what I can only describe as a drag parade (the mermaid parade in Coney Island *1). The book and the author are being talked about, and will most likely win many book awards.

I did what I usually do when I’m wresting with a book that features identities or communities or content that I am unfamiliar with. I asked people I trust. I shared my thinking with them, and I listened. In many ways this essay is more about the conversations I had and continue to have while trying to come to terms, rather than some sort of clean conclusion. *I will be adding footnoted changes to this post as they happen.

When I first read the book I thought it was beautifully drawn. Full of soft colors, and gentle edges. Like fine pastels rubbed into expensive paper. There is a lushness to the images. When reading it I saw the care of the illustrator for her art, but I also so her Whiteness, her straightness, her cis-ness. I felt it in my bones and I could not shake the fact that I did not like the book. It was like eating a big meringue – sweet, technically beautiful, but it left a cloying, unpleasant taste. I wanted to name the taste, to objectify it, to explain it, to defend my dislike. I didn’t want to simply say “It isn’t an #OwnVoices book”. That was a convenient reason but not a complete one.

Literacy is a social act, and I find that my reading of the world is better when done in collaboration with others who do not share my view of the world, my history, or my identity. So, I talked to teachers who are Dominican, to librarians, and finally, to a trans girl named Indigo.

Stacey (not a pseudonym) is a teacher and she’s Dominican. I asked her about the book because I knew I needed to get handle on the language used. There are differences in the ways Latinxs speak and act within our communities and I didn’t want my Mexican-ness to over-ride the Dominican-ness that the White author was trying to capture. Stacey’s response was helpful. At first I asked about the physical features of the women, their dress, the ways they moved, and the shoes they wore. “I found that the story depicted Afro-Carribean culture pretty well. From the shape of the abuelita, her head scarfs and dress, to the figures of the other characters, I didn’t see anything problematic.”

Stacey was generous, and she shared an unprompted idea with me.

I may of completely misinterpreted the theme, but I don’t know how likely it is for a Caribbean grandma to to take her grandson to a drag show and give him pearls after catching him in drag the first time. I think this story minimizes the real struggle LBGTQ members face in Caribbean culture where many of them are not accepted by society as they are in America.

The ease in which Julián’s abuela accepts and encourages him to show his whole self might be something the author put into the book as a wish or hope. But, by creating this almost immediate acceptance, Jessica Love negated the real struggle so many Latinx LGBTQ people must go through. Is that is the message the author is trying to send? Probably. But, it lands flat to me. For me, this comes from a place of privilege that would rather a mermaid trope carry the message and ignore the very real issues at work.

Which lead me to a completely different Stacy and her colleague who helped me think about the whole mermaid deal. Stacy Collins (@darkliterata), who can be found over on the blog Medal on My Mind. I had lots of questions about the book.

Was this some sort of Trans Tail (Get it? Tale … like a story? and Tail like a mermaid? Sorry, I had no choice, the pun had to be written. I don’t make the rules). I get that there is a transformative narrative to mermaids, but if we are looking at a picturebook about a trans girl, or a gender fluid child, then why is Julián gendered on the very first page as male? Public librarian and friend Kazia Berkley-Cramer (@cateyekazia) pointed out the gendering thing and the fact that it continues throughout the book, even when he puts on a fancy headpiece, tablecloth tail, and big bauble-pearls his abuela hands over to complete his ensemble. She also wanted me to know that families are finding this book helpful and that isn’t nothing. But, for me, I keep looking at this book and I don’t think it is about a trans girl, or a gender fluid kid. It is really about a boy dressing up as a mermaid. Stacy Collins very aptly pointed out, “A fish tail is not inherently feminine, unless Julián wants it to be.”

It is important to point out (which I neglected to the first time this was posted) that Kazia was, overall, an advocate for the book. Her reasons were simple and compelling – her patrons. In her library she keeps the book in the “myself” section and Julián is a Mermaid provides her patrons with a character that they can watch come into being as without being chastised. In the first posting of this piece I neglected to give Kazia’s point a view much air. Probably because it departs from my own, but the fact is, there is a scarcity of books that show any kind of gender fluidity or flexibility with gender roles without punishment. That is a huge concern and, in that case, this book can do good things. (*4)

And, that is an issue I keep running into with this book. It isn’t clear what, if anything, Julián wants to express because this isn’t really Julián’s story. It is Jessica Love’s story, a story of a young Dominican boy, playing dress up or constructing himslelf, as imagined by a White, cis woman who brings her identity to the work, and with her identity comes her outsider’s gaze.

And, I think that is what bothers me the most. It isn’t JUST that Jessica Love isn’t a trans person of color. It is that there is no where in the book where I am not aware that this is another book about looking AT a trans body. The transformation of the body is a huge fixation, almost a fetish, for cis folks. We just can’t seem to get that it isn’t only about changing the body. Being trans is too complicated to reduce to a single idea or experience – not matter how hard we try as cis folks to make it just about the ONE THING (*2). The intrusive gaze on Julián’s private transformation wasn’t obvious to me. Instead, a young woman pointed it out to me and in that moment I knew the truth of it.

Indigo, a 16 year old trans girl (ugh, when do teens stop being boys and girls? I still call my sons’ friends boys and they are 15 and 16, so I’m going to stick with girl) who tweeted out under the Children of the Glades twitter handle dropped a truth bomb that continues to stick with me. They are a group of teens that identify as “Florida Seminole & Miccosukee” who are reading children’s and YA literature and giving scholars, teachers, librarians and other literary gatekeepers some enormous things to think about.

Indigo looked at the objectification of yet another “brown femme” body and felt danger there. Do I think that is what the author meant? No. But, it is more important to listen to what Indigo saw and felt as she read. I’d love to ask Indigo about the way she was reading this image – what gave her the creeps? Was it the heavy lidded eyes, so often associated with “bedroom eyes”? The fact that Julián is nearly naked in his tighty whities? Maybe the blush on his cheeks? When I start reading, seriously reading this image with this and some of the other commentary Indigo put out on Twitter, I began to get an inkling. I suspect the issue is the intimacy we, as outsiders, read and bear witness to seeing Julián build his gender representation from the world of his grandmother’s house.

I had a lot of things I wanted to ask Indigo. She was generous in her critique, to let it out into the Twitter-verse for all to see and I feel especially lucky that I saw it, read it, reached out to her and the other Glade teens.

I have a lot of things I still want to ask Indigo about, a lot of books I want to know what she thinks of, like Alex Gino’s new You Don’t Know Everything, Jilly P. , and Rebecca Roanhorse’s Trail of Lightning. She was excited to find out that my main interest is in comics and graphic novels, so there was a whole world that was open to us to talk about … especially the new Captain Marvel movie!

But I can’t.

I can’t because she’s gone. Because, like too many queer teens and too many Native teens, and too many two spirit teens, she saw no way to survive, to move forward (Twitter announcement) . As Alexis:18 writes, “Indigo made a split-second decision that stopped her transitioning life. I know she wanted other Native 2SQ [two spirit] teens to get there.”

And so, selfishly, I mourn (*1) Indigo’s death for what I lost. Mourning for her, a teen so close to my own son’s age, feels too large and hard for me to do all at once. For her friends and family, I cannot begin to know how they feel. If I am affected by the loss of her potential, they are living with the gravity of the loss in ways I cannot know.

So, yes, Jessica Love wrote and illustrated a book that may or may not be about a young, gender fluid child, trying to find their way in the world. But, I can’t shake the feeling that this is simply not her story to write, and in the act of writing the book, she once again laid claim to what was not hers.

Rest in peace and power Indigo.

Footnotes of changes

Updated: September 24, 2018 7:48 pm
— Added Coney Island Mermaid parade
— Tried to better explain grief.
Updated: September 24, 2018 8:08 pm
— Not surprising, I misrepresented trans experience in paragraph 5.
Updated: 9/24/18 9:57 pm — many typos.
Updated: 9/25/18 1:38 pm — added more information about positive librarian views

#KidLitWomen: An Open Letter to Well-Meaning White Women

March 30, 2018booktoss 25 Comments

Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

-Letter from a Birmingham Jail
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
16 April, 1963

In King’s 1963 Letter from a Birmingham Jail he called out the what he referred to as “white moderates”. He held nothing back when he called out white moderate BS, “I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice.” Sound familiar?Today, in Children’s literature and other spaces, we deal with what I like to call Well Meaning White Folks (WMWF) who deal with social justice issues by gaslighting, tone policing, and outright hypocrisy. These are the WMWF who support change as long as that change in no way calls for self reflection or action.

No, We Won’t “Calm Down” by Robot Hugs.

I can always tell when I am dealing with WMWF by their rallying cry “be nice” or “choose kindness”, as if the act of calling out racism, misogyny, ableism and homophobia is the problem and not the act of racism, misogyny, ableism and homophobia. King was on to this BS when he wrote, “Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive.” [emphasis added].

As a proud Latina lesbian and member of today’s Call Out Culture I gain solace by reading King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Lately, some horrible truths have come out, specifically, Anne Ursu’s article highlighting the prevalence of #MeToo moments in professional #kidlit spaces. The resulting fallout and backlash has been hard to watch for many reasons including the defensive reactions of WMWF who don’t want to air out, talk about, reflect on, believe, or change the engrained male* dominated power structures.

Unchecked Entitlement, Privilege, and Power

Recently a White male author, Marc Tyler Nobleman was called out on social media for participating in an all-White, all-male panel at a Children’s literature conference in 2018. He was so hurt by the public discussion of his actions that he decided to write a blog post about it. Let me be clear, Marc Tyler Nobleman, like many WMWF, claims to be an ally. So, when he was called out, his immediate response was to pull bucket after bucket from the seemingly endless well of defensive phrases that WMWF have at their disposal. He began by defending his choice of participating in an all-male, all-White panel with the ultimate in weak-tea excuses, “I did not think to ask who else was presenting.”

He pulls suggestions right out of the Protect the White Male Status Quo! handbook, “Rather than start with public shaming or snark, instead contact the event organizer and participants directly and privately to express the concern civilly.” Let’s be clear Well Meaning White Folks are more invested in protecting their uncontested vantage point of privilege than in changing a system that keeps them there.

To be sure, the status quo in Children’s literature is that White, male, straight, and able are the norms and should be left unquestioned and unchallenged. Look at any professional Children’s literature space – from conferences to classrooms – who are the vast majority of people in those spaces? Well Meaning White Women (WMWW). And who is pretty damn quick to come to the defense of men called out in these #MeToo moments? WMWW. Perhaps White women in Children’s literature are invested in protecting the status quo because they enjoy the privilege of being adjacent to the unchecked entitlement of men.

No one is unaffected by the colonizing social structures that are in place and protected by the status quo. All of us are responsible for upholding White male dominance at one point or another in our lives. What many of us are asking for now is for WMWF to have the hard conversations, look at their own actions, and believe us when we tell you, “that is not ok and here are all the reasons why”.

Honestly, this #MeToo in Children’s lit is missing an important conversation that I suspect has been happening on a separate and parallel whisper network. I have been part of conversations about the discomfort of unchecked entitled behavior of White women, specifically towards Black male authors. I have seen White women^ (and yes, it has always been White women^) approach Black male authors and

– Stroke biceps
– Press boobs against arms and/or shoulders while taking selfies
– Touch his hair (including braids, dreads, afros, and facial hair)
– Stroke his bald head (seriously? WTF is that about?)
– Sidle up as he’s talking to a small group of people, and move a hand across his lower back/upper butt region
– Touch his butt

All of this was done silently and without consent. (There is also some really weird lesbian fetishizing but Malinda Lo covered that over on Twitter). And, before the pearl clutching begins, I know this is NOT the same as the #MeToo incidents in Anne Ursu’s piece, or the ones in the comment section of the School Library Journal piece. The reason this is important for our professional community to think about is that Black men live with the very real memory of Emmet Till and the White woman who’s statements got him killed. They live with the fetishizing of Black bodies by White people. This is another, different, way unchecked entitlement makes us all lesser.

Actions We All Need to Take

I am not going to ask you to sign a petition, or put on a pin or buy a ribbon. Instead, I am going to provide some helpful and actionable items for all of us.

First, if you think someone is on the receiving side of unwelcome attention and fetishizing you can open a safe space for them. Here is a helpful comic by Maeril. It is specific to Islamophobia but I think it works in pretty much every situation when people are behaving with unchecked entitlement.
– Make eye contact with the person BEING intruded upon
– stand next to or near the person BEING intruded upon
– Engage the person BEING intruded upon in conversation

And what should you do if you find yourself wanted to subject someone else with unasked for physical attention? You should ask for consent. This seems like a good plan for everyone in professional spaces … or any space, really. Ask before handling anyone, even if the handling is under the guise of flirting, humor, or as a result of that heady mix of alcohol and hotel keys.

And just in case you are confused, consent means saying the words that specify what you want to do and waiting until you get enthusiastic, verbal agreement. It would look something like this;
– “May I stroke your bicep?”
– “Ok if I put my arm around you and rest my hand on your ass?”
– “Can I rub your bald head?”
– “Is it ok if I press my breasts up against you?”

If you, Well Meaning White Women, feel embarrassed by asking a Black man for consent at a public book signing or other professional space thus putting your desire for physical contact with him into the of “light of human conscience and the air of national opinion” then you should not be doing it at all.

*I know not all men. And, I also know some women. Don’t start with that.
^I know not all White women. Don’t start with that, either.

Graphic Novels to Share: Bingo Love

February 23, 2018booktoss 3 Comments

Comics are the medium or form – images and words working together, bounded by panel, to communicate. Any story can be told using the comics form, just as any story can be told in paintings, film, poetry, or traditional print-text novels. I study graphic novels, but lately I am not sure that term means what I think it means.

When I say graphic novels I mean long-form comics that are not Manga or comic books (sometimes known as floppies). But, the problem of defining a form that is constantly changing and evolving, like graphic novels, is that it is like trying to determine a toddler’s shoe size while chasing them around Disneyland. There is so much movement, excitement, fear, and joy that the point of the event (defining, this gaining clarity) is sometimes lost on the need to impose a structure.

The issue I am butting up against this week is what about trades? Trades are usually comic book story arcs that are originally published as a set of floppies and then is published – without all the ads and previews – in a “graphic novel edition”. Examples are DC Comic’s Batwoman: Elegy (Rucka, Williams, & Jones, 2010), and more recently Marvel’s AMERICA: The Life and Times of America Chavez (Rivera et al., 2017). In other words, the big two (Marvel and DC) are putting out trades by the truckload (all the while canceling comic book series that feature people of color – but that is for a later post).

Trades are also being published by smaller presses and independent comic artists with the help of crowdsourced funding. One such project is Tee Franklin and Jenn St-Onge’s graphic novel Bingo Love (published by Image Comics).

There is a lot to love about this graphic novel (I’m writing this post, so I’m calling it a graphic novel). The book opens with a large panel showing a young woman crying and being comforted by an older woman. The scene takes place in “Jenkins Home for Seniors in 2038”. The young woman has been kicked out of her home for “liking girls”. I have to admit that this opening had me worried. But, the older woman, Hazel, begins talking about when she first met the love of her life, Mari in 1963 at church bingo.

The story is told from Hazel’s point of view and so we see her attraction burst forth beginning with the first time she sees Mari. Although they are in middle school, it is clear to Hazel that she doesn’t simply like Mari as a friend. Instead she realizes pretty quickly that she’d like to marry Mari and live happily ever after.

The pacing of the book is the only thing that keeps it from being great. There are quick jumps in time that are accomplished by collages that show the progression. These quick jumps in the emotional narrative are a bit jarring and I wish Franklin took more time and space to develop the characters, including the minor characters, and the setting.

The girls grow up as best friends, but their friendship does’t change until they are older, perhaps seniors in high school. One day they have their first kiss, they confess their mutual love for each other, and get in trouble for that love. Both girls are told they cannot see the other. Hazel is ready to run away with Mari and make a life. Mari hesitates and all is lost.

We see Hazel get married to James, and by the time she was 38 she had three kids, was miserable and still dreaming of Mari. We see Hazel and James’s kids grow, have kids, and then, one Mother’s Day she goes to bingo with her daughter and then BAM … Mari enters the story again. The two women who shared a first kiss almost 50 years ago are reunited. But, not everyone is happy about the reunification of lost love … especially Hazel’s daughter, Marian.

This time Mari is ready to commit. The next section of the book is amazing. Love blossoms but it isn’t without complication. Hazel deals with her feelings, goes to therapy (which is something we rarely see PoC do in any sort of media!). Hazel begins to move away from the life without Mari and begins building a new life that includes love and her family.

The narrative focuses on women’s lives and their humanity. One woman is shown breastfeeding, another as her water breaks as well as just after she gives birth (there is even an umbilical cord!). Perhaps most importantly Hazel and Mari are shown as fully realized people with desires, humor, hunger, and even stinky feet.

One panel brings tears to my eyes every time. I want to spend some time on it here to explain why this book is important – important to bring into the classroom.

Look at all these women. Look carefully. What do you see? I see a multitude of shades, body types, ages, and sexual identities in one space enjoying life and celebrating love. This graphic novel celebrates the loving relationship of two older, black lesbians.

Books: Keep or Toss (Vol 4)

November 28, 2017November 29, 2017booktoss Leave a comment

I use the term Booktoss as a way to communicate to the Literary Gatekeepers that we need to be willing to see the problems with books and toss some of them aside.

Decelerate Blue by Adam Rapp and Mike Cavallaro

There are a few consistencies in my life. Truisms about myself that I take for granted. I have always looked White and been Latinx. I’ve always been really strong and fat. I have been gay since before I knew what it meant to be a lesbian. I grew up expecting NOT to see my stories, but always in the lookout. I swooned when the Bionic man kissed the Bionic Woman – not because I wanted to BE him, but I sure as hell wanted to kiss her.

Constantly searching for signs of LGBTQ life, characters, and yes, even romance was a constant. Discovering #ownstories published by small presses and sold out of lesbian bookstores that smelled of candles, hemp, and essential oil, sold non-ironic macramé, and specialized in the production of purple clothing was a rite of passage. It was rare to see any representation of LGBTQ folks existing in media and when we did make it to the page or the screen there were a few, consistent tropes: we were single and funny, a murderer, crazy and destined for some institution, or dead (sometimes combos). And, overwhelmingly White.

So, yeah, I came of age when the bar for LGBTQ representation is pretty low.

We are all products of a homophobic, racist, and misogynistic society so these tropes are hard to recognize and even harder to de-colonize from our minds. If you are looking for a graphic novel that breaks from these expected tropes don’t bother with Decelerate Blue.

To be honest, it looks promising. The cover is a study of blues. There is what looks like a human heart in the center, with two young women facing each other, touching foreheads, in an embrace. The young women are flanked by much more violent images that make up a slightly recessed background and are colored in a darker blue. On the left, three people are holding long knives and looking determined, above their heads are hands grasping something between thumb and for-finger. On the other side, there are people in riot gear, attack dogs, and a young man getting arrested.

For those who have read Jane Yolen’s Foiled! and Curses! Foiled, Again!! you might recognize Mike Cavallaro’s illustrations. Angela, the 15-year-old protagonist, looks similar to Aliera from Foiled.

Angela lives in a future that values speed above all else. Movies last 15 minutes and are positively reviewed as hyper! Quick isn’t good enough, things have to be fastest! Literature is reduced to “brief lit”. This hyper existence is punctuated by short bursts of dialogue with each speaker signaling the end of an idea with “GO!”. This active and distracted life results in less time spent digesting what they consume – both mentally and physically. Heart rates are monitored, sleep is modified to keep everyone sped up, hyped up, and distracted.

Angela is a rebel and, as rebels often do, she finds herself in a literal underground community that values slowing down and is attempting to disrupt the hyper-commercialism, speed driven society. They practice meditation, eat farm to table, and crave a slower pace. Angela finds Gladys and romance blooms – in three days they are ready to declare their love, spend all their time together, and plan art projects. Seems pretty on par with most lesbian relationships.

SPOILER!!!

At some point things get creepy – and not in a good way. The underground rebels decide to take an experimental drug – Decelerate Blue – that quickens the slowing of their physiology – including their heart rate. Get it? They can’t wait to slow down, so they have to take a drug to make the process of slowing down go faster. When the three leaders tell the entire community to take this drug – which no one has ever heard of – they all comply. The followers are willing to take a drug, en mass, because their leaders tell them to. This was too much like the People Temple mass suicide/murder overseen by Jim Jones in 1978. The image of a bunch of young people ingesting a drug on the say-so of their leaders is only one of the serious issues I have with this graphic novel.

Just after feeding each other the pill and laying down to wait for the effects to take hold the underground compound is attacked by security forces in riot gear wielding batons and dogs. The attack is vicious, and to no lesbian’s surprise, Angela and Gladys are separated. Angela sees Gladys taken down by a dog, her hand outstretched, her eyes fading. Angela is saved, the underground caves are filled in with ultra-quick drying cement thus sealing the fate of the entire community. After that, Angela is told her parents have arranged for her to be institutionalized to help her get over her behavior. She escapes, heads back to the entrance of the underground compound, and overdoses on the remaining Decelerate Blue.

Yeah. So that happened.

We, as adults, need to demand better from the books that represent mis- and under-represented communities. We need to insist on more substance than this tired collection of damaging tropes. Lesbians deserve to live. Period. We deserve books that show our lives are worthy and worthwhile. This is not that book.