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  Bell Hooks Today I have had this “Less Hate More Love” crap shoved down my throat. Now that I have your attention- let me tell you- I think the world does need a lot of love. Our society causes many of us to be broken, traumatized, fragmented, and isolated. Good politics and good practices should help us heal, bring us closer, and should inspire us to love openly. However; the idea that we should approach all of our interactions and root our analysis only in love is not only simplistic- it is anti-feminist, silencing, and counters much of what we value throughout history.
Most of my feminist upbringing and socialization is directly related to the works of bell hooks. I love bell hooks and her contributions to race, class, and gender politics are invaluable. However; in the past couple of years she has turned her attention away from political struggle to more of an individual and spiritual look of oppression. She has also not pushed herself to engage with queer/gender/sex positive theories and practices. I recall some of her analysis of BDSM and feminism to be downright sex negative. However; for a long while as a youth I took nearly everything she said as gospel and still hold her near and dear in my heart. Even some of the spiritual woo-ness that she espouses has sort of a place in revolutionary political struggle. However; that place is not in the foreground. Her most recent article Building a Community of Love upsets me for many reasons. Her revisions radical history, her conclusions of radical work, and the simplistic nature that she posits valid political struggle get to my point of why it is positing our world in a love vs. hate is damaging and ineffective.
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  Last weekend local trans-identified community member Nik Rapier attended one of our most popular queer nights, Gaycation. While there he had an unfortunate incident of transphobia which he initially recounted on the global web project to combat street harrassment Hollaback. He has also agreed to share his story with qPDX readers below.
We were standing outside Holocene, cooling down from that overheated dance floor, when you reeled out the door, steps unsteady and eyes full of malice. After looking our little group over, you apparently decided that we didn’t pass your definition of acceptable gender presentations, because you stopped right in front of us and let fly some of the more transphobic comments I’ve heard in a drunken slur.
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  Doris Day on the cover of Collier's Don’t get me wrong. I adore how accessible making a movie has become thanks to the digital age. I can make a movie, you can make a movie, and the Olsen twins can make a movie. Almost all of that is pretty great. (cough cough)
However, I was watching a new movie yesterday, which shall remain nameless, and it depicted a real hard slice of American life. It was one of those slow moving works of probable fiction about a man who is so pathetic that you feel sincere pain in the marrow of your bones as you watch him sulk across the screen. Sulky managed to almost put me to sleep when I fell into an almost lucid trance and had a glorious vision.
I dreamed of Doris Day, and not just any version of Doris either. To promote the release of “April in Paris” in 1952 Doris appeared in full technicolor glamour on the cover of Collier’s, and not alone. She posed with poodles.
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  Katey Pants Another essay from the astute Katey Pants:
The past month there has been a crisis of safety in the queer community. Gay bashings, rampant rumors of Nazi gangs patrolling our community, and the Westboro Baptist Churches arrogance in claiming space in our communities. The response to this violence from police and politicians in Portland has offered us- at best- bureaucratic solutions to fundamental structural problems. However, I want to posit a different view of safety, care, and community outside of state and police solutions. I hope to provide some philosophical reasoning behind this and also present concrete things that are happening in Portland and throughout the country where people everyday are creating alternatives to police to keep themselves and their communities safe.
A Moral and Practical Argument Against Calling The Police:
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  Katey Pants for Diesel Femme. Photo by Kina Williams Community member, DJ, and femme fashionista Katey Pants has never been a qPDX contributor per se but this is at least the second time I’ve asked to borrow her erudite thoughts that she has publicly posted in other forums. Girl’s got a lot to say and I hope we all have a lot to say back.
Take it away KP!
In August, 2009, city officials in Multnomah County Oregon declared August 1st-8th Transgendered-Americans Week. In conjunction, organizers held a Gender-Free –For-All rally in Portland. I was not part of the organizing of the rally but an attendee. I also consider many of the organizers to be close allies and some friends. The march started with a celebration of the enactment of the Transgendered-Americans Week and a number of speeches, made predominantly by Portland politicians. From there our short and permitted march went through a neighborhood in NE Portland, led and surrounded by police.
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Love and Rage: A guest editorial from Katey Pants
Bell Hooks
Today I have had this “Less Hate More Love” crap shoved down my throat. Now that I have your attention- let me tell you- I think the world does need a lot of love. Our society causes many of us to be broken, traumatized, fragmented, and isolated. Good politics and good practices should help us heal, bring us closer, and should inspire us to love openly. However; the idea that we should approach all of our interactions and root our analysis only in love is not only simplistic- it is anti-feminist, silencing, and counters much of what we value throughout history.
Most of my feminist upbringing and socialization is directly related to the works of bell hooks. I love bell hooks and her contributions to race, class, and gender politics are invaluable. However; in the past couple of years she has turned her attention away from political struggle to more of an individual and spiritual look of oppression. She has also not pushed herself to engage with queer/gender/sex positive theories and practices. I recall some of her analysis of BDSM and feminism to be downright sex negative. However; for a long while as a youth I took nearly everything she said as gospel and still hold her near and dear in my heart. Even some of the spiritual woo-ness that she espouses has sort of a place in revolutionary political struggle. However; that place is not in the foreground. Her most recent article Building a Community of Love upsets me for many reasons. Her revisions radical history, her conclusions of radical work, and the simplistic nature that she posits valid political struggle get to my point of why it is positing our world in a love vs. hate is damaging and ineffective.
Continue reading »