HELLO and welcome to the 197th installment of Things I Read That I Love, wherein I share with you some of the longer-form journalism/essays I’ve read recently so that you can read them too and we can all know more about murder! This “column” is less feminist/queer focused than the rest of the site because when something is feminist/queer focused, I put it on the rest of the site. Here is where the other things are.
The title of this feature is inspired by the former title of Emily Gould’s tumblr, Things I Ate That I Love.
Justice, by Dominick Dunne for Vanity Fair, 1984
If you’ve been watching The People Vs. OJ Simpson then first of all, ME TOO, let’s talk about David Schwimmer, and secondly: the Vanity Fair journalist featured in the series, Dominick Dunne, has been writing about crime within the world of the rich and famous for quite some time now. His first big crime story for the magazine, though, was this one; about the trial for the murder of his daughter, actress Dominique, who was strangled by her ex-boyfriend. What’s interesting about this is that when your person is the victim, it doesn’t matter how rich you are (the Dunnes were very rich), other effed up loyalties can still stand in the way of you getting a fair trial, as demonstrated in this case.
The Best African-American Figure Skating In History Is Broke and Living in a Trailer, by Terrence McCoy for The Washington Post, March 2016
Debi Thomas was one of my favorite humans of all time and I am really sad to have read about this current affair.
Srsly, by Sarah Mesle for The Los Angeles Review of Books, November 2014
An essay about Texts From Jane Eyre becomes an essay about a lot of other things, too, like about the proliferation of smug dudes in literary and academic circles, who think only men write things worth reading. You will like this! “Texts from Jane Eyre recasts this joke — the repetition, in fact, is part of the joke — of a woman dealing with the self-involved Male Genius, who reaches out only to suck her into a tiresome male drama.”
Girls Gone Wild, by Katy Vine for Texas Monthly, September 2005
So don’t get too excited but pretty soon I’ll be debuting a new lesbian true crime column called “Ladykillers” and I’ve been doing a lot of research for it, which involves looking at a lot of murder cases. I came across this piece during my research. It involves lesbians and murder and a bunch of terrible things.
Jodie Sweetin’s Return to Predictability, by Rachel Syme for Complex, February 2016
A kind feature about Jodie Sweetin and the reboot of her life and also of Full House.
Our Pungent History, by Hunter Oatman-Stanford for Collectors Weekly, March 2016
As a bloodhound obsessed with everything smelling good all the time, I found this complete history of deodorant and perfume and also hygiene quite the read!
When Kids Are Accused Of Sex Crimes, by Sarah Stillman for The New Yorker, March 2016
The sex offender registry does a lot of good, but when it comes to juvenile offenders, it ruins a lot of lives worthy of redemption, and this is about that. This is really good you really should read it.
The Mall of America, by Ian Frazier for The Atlantic, July 2002
So this is about The mall of America and obviously I love reading about malls! But it’s about a lot of other things too, like the midwest, and the outsourcing of : jobs,
Different Love, by Allison Green for The Rumpus, March 2016
She writes about a lot of the things I wrote about in this essay about my sexual orientation — how one’s coming out narrative is not always a slow coming to terms with one’s true self so much as it can be a transition from one thing to another and can even involve choice.
Three months into my relationship with Karen, I wrote in my journal, “Now I fear I’ll never belong. I have loved men deeply. I love a woman now.” Was I really straight, a pretender in the lesbian community? Or was I uncovering my true nature and deluded about my past loves?
Joe Cool, by Alicia Eler for The New Inquiry, March 2016
On Trader Joe’s strategic absence from social media.
From the start, in 1967, “Trader Joe” Coulombe devised his “low-priced gourmet-cum-health-food store” with an “unemployed PhD student” in mind as the ideal customer. As he explained in 1985 to the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, he foresaw that this would be a “growing category.” Coulombe anticipated that these savvy, well-educated types would be alienated by mainstream advertising techniques, particularly ones that targeted an ignorance or lack in the consumer with products that were supposed to somehow fix it.
Whoa! I was not aware that I was the ideal target market for Trader Joe’s! It makes so much sense now that I think about it. I can’t write a paper without munching on some of their wasabi peas.
Love the finds this week! Thanks for mentioning the OJ show again, I had meant to check it out last time you did but forgot.
HOLY SHIT DO I LOVE THAT ‘DIFFERENT LOVE’ ARTICLE!!! Nail on the head for me.
Also I am super pumped about the true crime series (if pumped is the right word, I guess sad because it can be a category, but interested in whats going to be written)
Trader Joe’s ideal customers being broke grad students explains so much about my love of their stores. I’m fairly certain I would have failed out of grad school by now if I didn’t live within walking distance of one and have consequently been basically living off their dirt cheap but delicious cheese for the last three years.
I enjoyed all of these, really a stupendous TIRTIL this week!
In fact, I think we can all agree that this is The Week That Riese Won Lists
Also, the Different Love article really affirms my belief that everyone needs a sexuality infographic (maybe like those coming out infographics from way back when?)
Or maybe a stacked area chart, with time on the x axis and two plots for attraction and behaviour on the y axis, to properly show how people change as they live their lives.
You know, we are multitudes and all that; we deserve a few more statistical variables.
Thank you for the Different Love article. The phrase “born this way” has always bothered me, because even though I believe it can represent some people’s experience, it can also sound a bit like “I can’t help who I am”. Why do we feel the need to stress this inevitability, as if being gay was something bad that can’t be avoided?
Also in my experience a certain amount of choice has been involved, and I am really really glad for this article, so spot on.
excellent TIRTIL this week!!
The Mall of America article is fascinating. Thank you for all of these!
The trader joes article is interesting to me because it’s like, I never notice the companies that aren’t on social media, I just notice the ones that are because they’re fucking annoying?
Also I love trader joes with all my heart and once emailed their customer service to see if I could purchase one of their staff sweatshirts and they were really nice when they said no.
That Justice article was heartbreaking, and yet such a familiar story