Before we delve into the posts we’re reading and loving elsewhere on the internet, don’t miss Philippa Willitts’ discussion of DJ Khaled, oral sex, consent, and the way we talk about sexuality and stigma.
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‘Erika Lust Says She Has an ‘Ethical’ Alternative to ‘Mass-Produced’ Porn‘ (Tracy Clark-Flory for Jezebel)
If your perception of porn is of an industry with with exploitation and ethical violations, you’re getting a very small propagandised slice of a much later picture. Innovative female filmmakers are flipping the industry on its head, showing that it’s possible to make transcendent art from adult film, with high ethical standards.
Lust hasn’t been to Los Angeles in well over a decade, so her actual relationship to the mainstream business is next to nonexistent. For the most part, she occupies a parallel universe. As Chauntelle Tibbals, a sociologist and author who has studied the adult industry, puts it, Lust’s “degree of crafted, purposive separation” is “unique.” Her work has only been nominated twice for the AVN Awards, the so-called Oscars of porn in the US, and it isn’t difficult to find porn insiders with little clue as to who she is. As Lust puts it, “I stay apart from the industry.”
‘The Great Unsolved Mystery of Missing Marjorie West‘ (Caren Lissner for Narratively)
We’re big fans of true crime, especially explorations of very old crimes — investigating mysteries with rapidly dwindling living witnesses, missing evidence, changed landscapes, and other challenges is a fascinating pursuit. This richly narrated story of a sad crime and the family it left behind is well worth your time.
Many people believed in 1938, as they do now, that Marjorie was picked up at the road. Witnesses told police of three cars that had passed through the area around three p.m. The drivers of two were identified by Tuesday night. The third – whom witnesses said was a man – was seen fleeing in his Plymouth sedan so fast an oncoming motorist told police he had to pull into a ditch.
‘Inside the Secret Cities That Created the Atomic Bomb‘ (Amanda Kolson Hurley for Citylab)
The purpose-built ‘atomic cities’ developed during the Second World War to house top-secret operations involved in the development of the atomic bomb are fascinating environments. They provide an opportunity to see what creative planners do when they build a city from nothing: How do they lay it out? Which services do they provide? What kinds of decisions do they make to facilitate the city’s use?
It starts with the site selection. That was a very critical aspect of the decision to locate these facilities in Oak Ridge, Los Alamos, and Hanford. In each case, there were natural features, topographical features, that were considered to be favorable. In all three cases, they were somewhat remote—in the case of Hanford and Los Alamos, very remote—which offered a more secure environment, of course. But also, in the event of a disaster, an explosion or a radiation leak, that would also minimize the potential exposure of people outside the project to any sort of radiation danger.
‘The World Still Spins Around Male Genius‘ (Megan Garber for The Atlantic)
#MeToo is sparking some necessary conversations about the abusers among us and our ongoing tolerance for the ‘cult of male genius.’ You know the one. The famous auteur/author/actor/other ‘brilliant’ figure who gets a free pass on inappropriate behaviour because of his contributions to the art. But who pays for that? And what happens now?
“Talent is its own expectation,” Wallace wrote in Infinite Jest, and he was, of course, correct: There’s a canny tautology to all of this. Genius, a means to godliness and its best evidence, cannot be argued with. Genius cannot be reasoned with. Genius is the answer and the question. It will be heard. It will be respected. Even when it kicks and stalks and climbs up the side of the house at night.
‘The Women Who Speak For the Gods‘ (Juli Min for Hazlitt)
Shamanism is a minority faith in South Korea, and this is a fascinating exploration of the women who continue to engage in it even after being pushed out of society and stigmatised by authorities. How do you keep traditions alive in a culture that wants to reject them along with everything they stand for?
The kut center is at the foot of the mountains and a short drive from the nearest town. This is because kut are loud, rambunctious, disruptive affairs. Many local village shamans in Seoul have relocated in the past few decades, their temples and shrines destroyed by city development and reform policy. Their noisy, days’-long ceremonies that used to take place in the heart of communities have since been chased out by, in turn, the Confucians, Japanese imperialists, the South Korean military government, and Christians.
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Photo: Peter Shanks/Creative Commons