HELLO and welcome to the 293rd 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 Buffalo Wild Wings! 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 title of Emily Gould’s tumblr, Things I Ate That I Love.
The Theory of Visitors, by Sam Lansky for Human Parts, November 2017
I haven’t stopped thinking about this
“All relationships are transient,” she said. “Friends who stab you in the back. People you network with at a fancy party. Relatives who die. The love of your life. Everything is temporary. People come into your life for a limited amount of time, and then they go away. So you welcome their arrival, and you surrender to their departure. Because they are all visitors. And when the visitors go home, they might take something from you. Something that you can’t ever get back. And that part sucks. But visitors always leave souvenirs. And you get to keep those forever.”
Good Faith, by Tina Horn for Hazlitt, July 2019
Um, kinky sex and also cults and also queerness, A BLESSED DAY UPON YOU ALL:
I am now the age my mom was when she gave birth to my younger sister. Like many grown children, I do not want to repeat my parents’ mistakes. Since my love, my friendships, and my work all center around explorations of intimate power through the cultures of kink and the politics of sex work, I find myself considering the questions: what is the meaningful difference between identifying as a Leather queer and participating in a cult? How do you know whether you’re in a kinky polyamorous family or part of an abusive scam? And has settling into a comfortable role within Leather communities helped me to heal from generational trauma that my parents never seemed to have resolved for themselves?
An Epidemic of Disbelief, by Barbara Bradley Hagerty for The Atlantic, August 2019
When the rape kits that had been sitting in Cuyahoga County storage for years — most from cases that had been closed in a day or a week without any investigation — prosecutors were able to indict nearly 750 rapists, revealing new information about how shitty detectives are to rape victims AND how many serial rapists are out there AND that “the space between acquaintance rape and stranger rape is not a wall, but a plaza.”
I Wanted to Know What White Men Thought About Their Privilege. So I Asked., by Claudia Rankine for The New York Times Magazine, July 2019
It’s a gift to read any words Claudia Rankine writes, this brief look at academia’s investigation of white privilege followed by her own deliberate interactions with white men on this topic is no exception. I could crawl around in her brain forever.
I found the suited men who refused to fall in line exhilarating and amusing (as well as obnoxious). Watching them was like watching a spontaneous play about white male privilege in one act. I appreciated the drama. One or two of them chuckled at their own audacity. The gate agent did an interesting sort of check-in by merging the newly formed line with the actual line. The people in my line, almost all white and male themselves, were in turn quizzical and accepting.
Buffalo Wild Wings Was My One-Man Gay Bar, by Logan Scherer for Eater, May 2019
This began with a sentence I cannot relate to on any level as I often found discomfort at the Ypsilanti Buffalo Wild Wings (the Ann Arbor one came later) but of course; I was intrigued by this premise and it was interesting for nostalgic and
The Coast of Utopia, by Carina Chocano for Vanity Fair, July 2019
This article put me through so many emotions: first I was listless, like am I really the person reading this, why am I reading this and then I was like UTOPIA, INTERESTING and THEN I was like excuse me Australia’s High Court did what to indigenous land and listen, this takes you to unexpected places.
The Great Race to Rule Streaming TV, by Jonah Weiner for The New York Times, July 2019
All of our screens are now TVs, and there is more TV to watch on them than ever. More dramas, more comedies, more thrillers, more fantasy-adventure series, more dating shows, more game shows, more cooking shows, more travel shows, more talk shows, more raunchy comedies, more experimental comedies, more family comedies, more comedy specials, more children’s cartoons, more adult cartoons, more limited series, more documentary series, more prestige dramas, more young-adult dramas, more prestige young-adult dramas — more, more, more.
Rehearsals, by Leslie Jamison for The Nervous Breakdown, June 2011
This was a nice swift punch to the stomach.
Everyone talks about weddings as beginnings but the truth is they are also endings. They give a horizon of closure to things that have been slowly dissolving for years: flirtations, friendships, shared innocence, shared rootlessness, shared loneliness.
Looking forward to reading that the visitors wondering my lunch break
Jesus Christ superstar, Siri, that is not what I said
I’m dying
Looking forward to reading the visitors one during my lunch break
Absolutely loved Tina Horn’s kink/cults article. 13/10 would recommend.
AGreeeed!!!
ugh those guuuuuyss, the ones whose whole body is an inflatable butt plug of aggrieved privilege and desperate entitlement, pumped up with the need to be A BIG MAN
Which one do I read to get to the intriguing quote involving Lemony Snickett/GOOP in this column’s title?
I legit forgot that I could just google the phrase to find the article 🤣 happy Friday all!
LOL Google sends me to this comment of yours !
Ahahahhaah! Oh god
“An Epidemic of Disbelief” is full of awful numbers and stadistics but the worst, for me, was “49 out of every 50 rape cases, the alleged assailant goes free—often, we now know, to assault again. Which means that rape—more than murder, more than robbery or assault—is by far the easiest violent crime to get away with.”
This number applies only to the US, I can’t even think a number for the rest of the world, places that don’t even have the money to collect a rape kit, least of all run a DNA test. What the hell are we doing to all these women around the world?
PD: Retired Lieutenant Michael Sauro should at least lose his fucking pension. Lazy ass chauvinist motherfucker.
I haven’t read any of these yet but I honestly think this is the most compelling Things I Read That I Love yet.
The Utopia article about Byron Bay and it’s Influencer community was interesting. On a number of levels as you suggested. Maybe it’s because I’m not part of the generation that is a follower of this phenomenon that I find it all rather ridiculous but it did remind me that even in my relative youth ie, 20’s & 30’s there were still plenty of other people’s lives that many of us at the time, envied and wished to co-opt or emulate. I can remember my own deep disappointment when I realised that I’d never have the “Home Beautiful” house or lifestyle that appeared to go with it.
In retrospect, it was one of the better realisations that ever came to. With the benefit of hindsight and a much longer experience of life I’ve come to the conclusion that a graceful acceptance of who you are and what you can meaningfully offer the world and it’s other occupants is a far happier “lifestyle” to aim for.
As for Byron Bay, yes it is a lovely place to visit but beware the fake glitz the same as you would elsewhere in the world.
I also though that most of the rest of the world was familiar with our(Australia’s) reprehensible record on the rights and titles of Indigenous Australians. I’m surprised that some of our more recent High Court decisions that have reversed some of our more historical thefts of Indigenous land have not been more widely noticed especially since they have occurred in spite of strong government opposition on most occasions.
Our current government is almost in total opposition to the majority of the wishes of adult voting population. They hold government by one seat and a handful of occasional votes from Independent members of parliament who have to be courted each time they want to pass a Bill. It’s better than nothing but it’s slowly ruining the country and like the US really causing distress and despair in many places.
“The Theory of Visitors”. (Heart)(three hearts) Gosh darn my abandonment issues. Atleast this website will never leave me HAHA
I misread “The Coast of Utopia” as “The Cost of Utopia” and immediately starting nodding in agreement, like mm hm, mm hm, the cost of utopia is indeed high, I don’t even need to read that.
Mentally (Emotionally/outfit wise) preparing to travel across the country next week to attend the wedding of an ex with whom I had my longest and most significant relationship. Rehearsals KILLED ME. Absolutely perfect timing Riese–I’m crying into my coffee already.