Weekly Joy

"Out On The Water" by Camera

Marketing Diversity: WINdows and FAILdows at Holt Renfrew

In case you aren't familiar with Canadian retailers, Holt Renfrew is the high-end department store in the country. Holt's flagship store in Toronto is known for having creative and eye-catching window displays. I walked by there yesterday, and saw that their windows were set up for Valentine's Day in a series of five or six scenes, each featuring a mannequin couple and a mannequin cupid. Most of the couples consisted of a male mannequin and a female mannequin, and most of the mannequins were stark white.

This was the first display that really caught my attention:

Weekly Joy

This week: cute gifs!

Weekly Joy

This week: a couple of slacker-looking dudes goofing off while playing and absolutely gorgeous arrangement of Lady Gaga songs.

Crazy

Morgan constantly flits from one thing to another, and has never been able to settle on a single path in life.

"That Morgan is crazy!" someone comments. Ha ha ha!

Morgan is bipolar, and has been suicidal in the past.

* * *

Leslie is schizophrenic.

Someone elaborates, "Or in the words of those in the industry, cuckoo!" while drawing circles in the air next to his ear. Ha ha ha!

* * *

As a listener in those conversations, I was shocked. I should not have been.

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Before Meomi designed the mascots for the Vancouver 2010 Olympics... before they were even called "Meomi"... they made this video...

On Gay People Being Held To A Special Standard Of Goodness

Ever read Post Secret and think to yourself, "it's a good thing the secret-keeper keeps that one to themselves, because that's just offensive, and makes them look clueless." This week there was one of those.

If you can't see the image, it consists of a photocopied picture of soldiers in combat, over which someone has drawn rainbow stripes, and pasted the text:

I thought gays fought to promote tolerance of differences thus the rainbow flag representing their acceptance of diversity. Seems like fighting and killing are the exact opposite of promoting tolerance and diversity. 

Where to begin...

A Message To Christmas Warriors

My family is celebrating Christmas today. There are no carols on the radio. One person at work yesterday wished me "Merry Christmas," because she's celebrating today too; but there are no "Happy Holidays" from strangers. The only decoration in a public space that I've seen was a black-and-white computer-printed "Христос ся рождає" on the door of the liquor store by my parent's place. And it strikes me that this is what the "War on Christmas" people are afraid of.

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This week: Meme

Stupid Christmas Songs

Santa's not "rocking out." He's just really frustrated with some 

of the  stupid songs he has to listen to.

Christmas may have passed, but there are things about the holiday that stay with you long after it's over. Like songs that get stuck in your head. Now, I love me some carols. But there are some horrible, horrible Christmas songs out there. These are a few of them...

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This week: Hamilton Wesley Wigglebottom

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This week: a sleeping bunny



What can I say? Bunnies make me happy.

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This week: a bunny

Image source

Attention Whores

The idea for this post started a couple of months ago, when Lady Gaga wore a meat dress to the VMAs and spoke out about Don't Ask Don't Tell. Many internet commenters were insistent that Lady Gaga is not committed to gay rights, and that the entire effort was just to get attention. The phrase "attention whore" came up a few times. This bothered me. Since then, I've paid more attention to the way that celebrity women are talked about online.

Some examples (trigger warning for misogyny and wishes of death):

Ke$ha

I’m tired of seeing this dirty slag… can someone please inform her that her 15 minutes of fame are up?

Snooki

Snooki–because the world needs another no-talent fame-hag. 

Please dear God just make it go away..please…..

On a gif of Snooki floating through space:

Shame we can’t make this happen in reality – fortunately for me I’m not in the US, but I’ve seen enough pictures of this … *ahem* woman(?) … to know she’s a waste of oxygen!

Tila Tequila

Bitch should be kept in a damn cage.

this whore isn't dead yet?

Lady Gaga

She is disgusting, a completely irrelevant object. How can anyone look up to this woman.

god someone please set her on fire

When will this attention whore fall of the radar?

Lady Gaga and Yoko Ono

"I've been a talentless fame whore for decades. Let me take your hand and show you the way."

Most of these comments are from that pit of slut-shaming and homophobia, ROFLrazzi. The last one is from Jezebel.

There is so much wrong with the phrase "attention whore" itself, not to mention the way it is used to reinforce the dismissive and eliminationist language aimed at women who dare to live publicly, that it's taken me this long to figure out how to approach the subject. First, I'll address why we shouldn't be using "whore" as an insult. Then, why we shouldn't be using "attention seeker" as an insult. Finally, I'll talk about the implications of the entire phrase, and the way we talk about celebrities.

Foot

Wanna hear a funny story?

Yesterday, I went out with some friends to a pub, had a couple of beers, as well as a lovely time.

When I got home, I was in a fabulous mood. I was singing my favourite Christmas carol, and I thought to myself, "you know what would both express my cheer and look really cool? One of those spinning flip things."

GIFSoup