Below the fold…
Month: October 2016
Yuca Tres Maneras, Alyssa Style
After presenting a Cuban dish whose origins are primarily Spanish and another of West African extraction, it is only fitting that I present an unambiguous Taíno contribution to Antillean Hispanic cuisine: yuca.
Faith an Antitheist Could Like
I’m an antitheist, more so than many of the people in my social circle. I do not merely disbelieve in deities and the traditions that come along with them; I also think that other people should also disbelieve. I think that religion has, at best, severely outlived its usefulness and, more likely, has been a force for consistent ill in humankind’s history. I think them all false, and I think them all dangerous. There are some I find more palatable than others and some that are more reality-based than others, but none meet with my actual approval. I know many people who cleave to various religions and who are exemplary human beings my life is richer for including, and I know a much larger assortment of religious humans who fit in Donald Trump’s basket of deplorables. As a Taína trans lesbian, I am targeted for harms both ongoing and historic by the largest religious establishments in my vicinity, including through non-religious institutions nevertheless suffused with religious sentiment, and the entire edifice fills me with loathing; as a scientist, its non-empirical silliness me with irritated bemusement. As far as I am concerned, the good ones are good despite their faith, not because of it.
I’m often challenged, with all of that in mind, to describe what a version of Christianity my antitheism wouldn’t encompass would look like. If indeed my antitheism isn’t driven purely by emotional antipathy, then surely there is such a version. And there is.
Jane and Jessie: A Better, Shinier World – Epilogue
Chapter 1 – Chapter 2 – Chapter 3 – Chapter 4 – Chapter 5 – Chapter 6 – Chapter 7 – Chapter 8 – Chapter 9 – Chapter 10 – Epilogue
All 11 chapters in a single article (Patreon patrons only)
“Are you ready?” Lizabeth Hiromi asked her Pokémon. Gorebyss, Dragalge, Corsola, Golduck, and Kabutops nodded, as did the series of Seakings, Buizels, Medichams, and others behind her in or around the levitating globes of water on the Pacifidlog stage. She wore a costume version of her usual clothes, with more pronounced shoulders and a flared skirt instead of jeans, but retaining the triangle of exposed midriff. Behind her, her parents Kyle and Meredith and grandfather Ship helped direct the crowd of performers.
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Flamboyán Al Fin
He hoarded his Christmas gifts. We would get him cologne, ties, shirts, tchotchkes from our travels, treatments to soften his overworked hands, and they would all find their ways into drawers and cabinets, untouched for years. His clothing had to wear to nothing before he would discard it and start the next one’s slow disintegration. New, untouched things are a treasure to save for when they are needed, not an indulgence for in between. Scarcity is behind every shadow and over every hill, and a good hoard is insurance against doing without. It’s a habit my father, my grandfather, and I all share, to each other’s bemused frustration. They tangled with Communists, I grew up autistic, and we all hoard.
Jane and Jessie: A Better, Shinier World – Chapter 10
Chapter 1 – Chapter 2 – Chapter 3 – Chapter 4 – Chapter 5 – Chapter 6 – Chapter 7 – Chapter 8 – Chapter 9 – Chapter 10 – Epilogue
All 11 chapters in a single article (Patreon patrons only)
Ortolan’s door slid open, and the lights on his side of it cut out. Fog rolled into the room, cloaking the immediate vicinity of the door as the sound of shuffling feet finally prodded him to turn around.
To the door’s right, the light above Flannery turned on, and she announced, “To protect the world from devastation…”
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Nineteen Meltdowns: Pokémon Movies While Autistic
Pokémon is a long-running television series, currently spanning nearly 1000 episodes since its Japanese debut in 1997. Like many such cartoons, it also encompasses a number of feature-length films, set between the episodes of the series and occasionally referenced thereafter. The nineteen Pokémon films are a fascinating oeuvre in their own right, because they return repeatedly to themes particularly dear to me and to other autistic, indigenous viewers.
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Jane and Jessie: A Better, Shinier World – Chapter 9
Chapter 1 – Chapter 2 – Chapter 3 – Chapter 4 – Chapter 5 – Chapter 6 – Chapter 7 – Chapter 8 – Chapter 9 – Chapter 10 – Epilogue
All 11 chapters in a single article (Patreon patrons only)
The turbine shaft descended far below ground level, by Jessie’s calculations. At the bottom, the shaft entered a cavern, where large vents in the shaft allowed the rocks taken inside of it to fall out and, presumably, get carried elsewhere. The Pokémon laborers who would have done that carrying, or aided the Magnemites’ efforts to turn the drill via the long rods sticking out into the cave, were long gone, but evidence of their violent departure lay scattered about. Even the Magnezone was gone, apparently still healthy enough to flee once whatever force compelled its aggression let it go. Jane, Jessie, and a minute later Flannery reached the bottom and waved goodbye to their steel assistants as they climbed into the cavern to take in the drill.
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The Way of the Heathen – A Review
Reading The Way of the Heathen, first and foremost, reminded me of why I fell in love with Greta Christina’s writing. A series of meditations on weighty topics from an atheist, science-loving perspective, The Way of the Heathen is the antidote to religious insistence that we have no answers for what it means to live a life well lived, and a much-appreciated bridge between the scientific and the sublime.
Jane and Jessie: A Better, Shinier World – Chapter 8
Chapter 1 – Chapter 2 – Chapter 3 – Chapter 4 – Chapter 5 – Chapter 6 – Chapter 7 – Chapter 8 – Chapter 9 – Chapter 10 – Epilogue
All 11 chapters in a single article (Patreon patrons only)
Jane and Jessie proceeded downward apace, having learned the pattern in which the flamethrowers and cameras were arranged around the shaft. They got frantic attention from the guards and other staff whenever they crossed a glass region, but no attempts against them could be made while they methodically destroyed the weapons that enforced the turbine’s shape. Up above, the Magnemites increasingly strayed from position but didn’t leave the shaft or otherwise make their defiance known. From below, a disc-shaped Pokémon flew upward, stopping at the level Jane and Jessie had reached. Its raised head and the trio of horseshoe magnets on its rim identified it as a Magnezone, and it immediately began collecting energy to aim at the two humans.
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