Nurturance Culture In Action

Nurturance Culture By Nora Samaran

Through this work, an advance reader copy of Turn This World Inside Out, The Emergence of Nurturance Culture by Nora Samaran found its way into my hands. And although at 140 pages it’s only little, its impact on me has been disproportionately large. It has helped me find compassion; it has helped me connect fragments of ideas which existed in my brain already, but floated untethered in abstract (where they were of no use at all).

Brown Paper Packages Tied Up With String

With time restrictions therefore, my options are few; but I’m determined to make it work. After all between an apocalyptic future exploding in glorious glitter, and any other future where presents look like World War Two rations, I’ll go for the latter.

Boy, You’ll Be A Woman… Soon

No one does make up for men like Tim Curry

For a woman like me–a die-hard fan of The Rocky Horror Show who lustfully watched Sweet Transvestite on loop –the news that Chanel launched it’s first make-up for men on September 1 2018 in South Korea, was wildly exciting.

The Face of a Dying Breed, The European Brit

These are the people we need to focus on nurturing as geographical and technological mobility create a growing crisis of clashing moral standards and integration of cultural opposites. He is the type of ambassador I want out in the field demonstrating the best of what it means to be European Brit.

Why Communists turn into Nationalists

As causes grow in popularity, the original victims are often left behind whilst those already in power claim more space and more status by piggybacking on these issues without having suffered first-hand experience in order to promote their own agenda.

Life without Facebook? Is there any chance for escape?

Depressingly, a portion of those ‘success stories’ who did not return to Facebook had simply replaced Facebook with other social media. Far from extracting themselves from an algorithmic life, they had only jumped out of the proverbial frying pan into the fire.

What Aziz Ansari Did Does Not Make Him A Criminal, Unfortunately

Power is the capacity to influence others which–notwithstanding systemic privilege–fluctuates, sometimes on a daily basis according to self esteem, personality, age, maturity and in every unique relationship dynamic. How can power be measured or compared, when there is no absolute, and perception of power is also a form of power?

Thor Ragnarök: A Baby Step in Equality

Thor Ragnarok. A baby step for equality.

World building, as Marvel has proven it can pull off over the last decade, is a skill I admire, it’s an escapist’s ultimate playground–yet my aversion to imperialism and the influence of a feminist education on how I perceive fictional heroes and supervillains ate holes in the fabric of my appreciation.

Overheard Conversations Are The Most Interesting

A few choose to queue, indicating their impatience by folded arms and tapping feet. Others return chastened to their tables littered with remnants from the first round, but their bodies stay tense, mouths quivering with injustice.

One Alternative Sex Shop Leads the Way in Consent

Sex Shop

Sex shops themselves serve as a kind of a sex-toy curation service and could theoretically buy healthier selections for their clientele. That’s a responsibility few sex shops choose to shoulder in a capitalist system where sex sells.

Bringing Attention to Atrocities in an Apathetic Western World

Refugee Voices Tour

But there is no victorious ‘democratic’ ending to this story. In Syria the civil uprising has gradually been transformed into a full scale civil war. Sayid and his colleagues have all lost loved ones to this war and their political is personal. Sayid’s own crime–and why he is here–was to film government violence and put it up on YouTube, after which he was put on the list of wanted terrorists.

TBINAA | What Can We Laugh at Now?: Political Correctness and Humor

What we find funny is indicative of our beliefs, attitudes, judgements and opinions. It is a useful barometer. When we mock those who by birth or circumstance are less fortunate, we become persecutors and make others our victims. We have no less duty of care for verbal abuse even through humour, than we do for physical abuse.

TBINAA | How Racism Fueled the Manchester Attacks

The Manchester Memorial sign following the terrorist attack at the O2, featuring Ariana Grande

Britain has never taken responsibility for the bloodshed and exploitation which built the empire. This is evidenced by Theresa May’s hardline on Brexit. We want to take without giving anything in return. We make no apologies for our xenophobic attitudes; our comedy ridicules ‘those bloody foreigners’, our narrow-minded and disrespectful behaviour often shames us in the countries we visit.

Harry Potter Normalizes Abuse

Maybe it’s my depression that twists a rainbow world into shades of grey. Or maybe the Order of the Phoenix really is a minefield riddled with C-PTSD.

White Fragility and the path to White Depression

Gone are the days when I positively affirmed every day in the shower, and shared uplifting memes. Now I see these past behaviours as tragic extent of mine and others’ unawareness. I thought if I changed my mindset and concentrated on dismissing the negative and amplifying positive activism, that the world I wanted would resettle itself with my aligned actions.

White woman in the mirror

Privileged white woman pain is more gradual and less dramatic than that experienced by intersectional minorities. It is insidious. Kind of like bonsai trees, white women have the innate capacity to grow to a normal size but our roots and branches are cut so that we grow far smaller. Stunted or trained along a trellis in such a way that few see, sometimes not even us.

Mithridatism and the Validity of White Guilt

Like Mithridates, the ancient Greek King who–legend has it–ingested small amounts of poison to create immunity, it is the art of swallowing what we hate little by little, of being formed by it, developing an immunity to it and even learning to appreciate the rush it gives us so we can make it in this sick world. If it is no longer poisonous to us, it is easier to dish it out as we deny that it’s poison. It’s still poison though.

No Such Thing As Legitimate Democracy in the U.K. & U.S.

Thus a racist, classist and hierarchical society which favours the few over the masses cannot be truly democratic because power is unequally distributed among and through many channels. And where there is a power differential, this compromises the ability of the marginalized groups to consent.

TBINAA | The Cowardice of the White Woman

Image representing the cowardice of white women in the face of marginalized oppression

Maybe it was then I first asked the question: would I risk my own life to protect the Anne Franks of this world? The answer was always yes. But hindsight is a flattering bedfellow.

Why Violence is used to Counter Fascism (in three parts)

But the course of your chosen response in the fight against dehumanization is not necessarily dictated by your political stance. Whether you use reasonable discourse or violent protest is more likely be influenced by another factor: privilege, and how your privilege promotes your own survival.

The Disenfranchised European Progressive

There could be many potential reasons not least that to become a overseas voter is a bureaucratic nightmare, especially for those like me who left before voting age. When I eventually found the energy to jump through all the hoops, I was turned away. The electoral commission had only been formed in 2001 and when I discovered the website several years later, my rights had already expired.

What my White Privilege Says About Punching Nazis

For people of colour, white ethics do not promote their survival–it only promotes white people’s survival and usually at the expense of theirs. People of colour have not been allowed voice, still today have less voice and any choice of an ethical framework–even by me, a white person–is ill-informed if it does not take this into account because our reality is weighted privilege.

Use Psychology to end Trump Presidency

Donald Trump uses ‘alternative facts’ to achieve harmony in his inner world. He’s put a photo on his wall describing the crowd as a ‘sea of love’ indicative of the fact he craves adulation.

It always was a Post-Truth Era, the difference now is that we know it

We have always been in a post-truth era because our interpretation of truth can only ever be subjective. Today the difference is that Trump doesn’t pretend to be objective. As a narcissist, it is impossible for him to be anyone other than who he is. I’d wager he believes his own stories, no matter what facts might say.

How Trump Triggers Complex Trauma

Like the flare up of an allergy, and since the shock of the midsummer brexit, I am now in hypervigilance. I see potential harm long before it turns into active threat. And when the red rage comes, I fight or flee to remove that potential from my environment, from my children’s environment. With the Trump presidency, I cannot. It is everywhere. I see it everywhere. Threat is everywhere.

Donald, Do you want to be a Superhero or Megavillain?

You’ve heard it in so many wise texts; power is a gift, use it wisely. And what is wisdom? Wisdom is understanding that you know very little and that that is a natural consequence in being human. You are human. And you know very little.

Ethics of Family Screws Democracy

We attach to those of our ilk, beyond rationality. And few of us have enough self-awareness to overcome it. The law and our systems were designed to counteract this; ‘the law is reason free from passion’. The very concept of the American electoral system is based on a fundamental belief that some people are able to be more objective than others and will vote for the benefit of all. And yet because of the strength of their own self-interest, the strength of their own reptilian instincts, they will naturally fail to do so.

My Privilege is Uncomfortable

So white folk, we have a task in front of us which might seem huge, but really it isn’t. It is to face our own prejudice when the most obvious and comfortable way to survive is to stay in our bubble. It is to step up and be accountable for our ignorance, even if ignorance is part of our humanity. I will hold your hand as we overcome our fragility and cultivate empathy and battle our minds which tell us that it’s not our problem.

Fighting My Daughter’s Racist Formula

In-groups are formed by what we consider to be ‘relevant’ familiarity. Children, and even adults, process most of our information visually which means that varying skin tones might be not only the first but also the only indicators for who is ‘in’ and who is ‘out’.

Racism stigma furthers the Racist Agenda in Sweden

One reason why this immigration was considered successful had nothing to do with Sweden’s ability to integrate immigrants; only that the type of immigrants arriving were more easily ‘integrate-able’ as is still the case today for me. At first sight therefore, when immigrants are able to fit into Swedish culture at a level which allows them to peaceably live and work within the system, we do not see backlashes against immigration.

To Those Who Advise Compassion for Trump Supporters

If you are not at the centre then don’t shit on the person whose been hurt – your job is to support them. If you yourself need support in order to do that, bitch to people who are less affected by it; comfort in, dump out… On a macro scale don’t give more burdens to those who have been oppressed. Don’t expect compassion from those who have been dumped on. It is not their job to show it.

What Greater Good is There Than Integrity?

But when people are dear to me, I feel they deserve more than ghosting. They deserve at least an attempt to explain why our relationship will be changing. The choice is not binary of course, we could simply be less in each other’s lives. I could reduce contact, fobbing them off with excuses until I achieved my desired effect. But that reduces their power of consent. If they knew how I truly felt about their values and/or consequent actions, then they may choose to cut contact altogether.

Are you a Burning Woman?

Burning Women–as an archetype in our psyche, not a prescribed gender–are rising in the form of intersectional feminists, queer activists and angry people of colour. We are the rule breakers and we demand that our voices be heard. And as we get stronger, so the forces which suppressed us wage an ever more fierce war. But they cannot stop us.

Humans are pre-programmed to objectify. So how can we help it?

Because I went. I saw Tarzan. I objectified, and thoroughly enjoyed doing so, thinking it at best harmless fun and at worst a sort of inconsequential revenge for all the years that my sisters and I have been objectified. This is what the men go on about, I thought. Yes, it’s fun.

Trump, Weltschmertz and Me

I’m not laughing anymore. I’m crying because what this farce of an election has done, is to uncover evil in my own home, in my own friends and yes, also in myself. It has torn the veil off those relationships I believed were rock solid. Not because my world or social circle are anything like as extreme as Trump, but because extreme or not, his vile behaviours–like the objectification of women–are so commonplace.

The Black Despair of Sexual Shame

The black despair of sexual shame

That was the year I walked alone, that I suffered ridicule, ostracisation and emotional abuse from my classmates. That year I cried night after night.

Purple Prose ushers in a new era of Bisexual Visibility

The ideas that Purple Prose lay out are not new; but they are published. Publication does a lot to validate ideas in our world since our collective unconscious recognises validity most often through third party verification.

Britain & Her Island Mentality

But when you dig down into the voting statistics, some very obvious truths surface. Those like me–generation X,Y or post Y and/or many with immigrant heritage–voted remain. Almost half of us. The baby boomers voted leave. Was it their fear of change?

Torn Between Two Worlds and Ableist Language Shaming

Experience inadequacy and confusion when you go out, try to grapple with vastly different public transport systems, inadvertently miss bill payments because the sheer volume of foreign administrative mail takes literally days to wade through. Be misunderstood for your communication and have people shout louder at you thereby triggering your childhood trauma. And then spend even more years trying to learn the language starting with ‘Lesson 1: how to buy an apple’ instead of the more useful topic ‘Lesson 367: dealing with online banking and tax declarations.’

I know what a fucking apple is and how to buy it, since apples and currency work the same in pretty much every language.

How to Start Using Your Privilege by a Cis-White Woman

To learn on one hand that I have perpetuated systemic oppressive behaviours, and on the other having to face those who have been oppressed and who are angry at me for doing so makes me want to shield myself from the onslaught which risks triggering the terror I felt as a child.

But if I truly want to be an ally, I cannot ignore it.

Harlot Magazine | The Relevance Chasm between Gen X and Y

The consequence is that I must accept the younger generation has implicit knowledge and awareness of current culture that I do not because they have easier access than I do, to their landscape. They grew up in it and they have insights that I do not.

Why I’m Not An Angry Feminist (Any More)

At first, I felt guilty about not feeling angry. What had happened? Wasn’t anger a healthy expression at the outrage in the world? I should be feeling it!

“Feminists,” I told myself sternly, “should be angry. There’s a lot to be angry about.”