From fd86fefb34d1534e55996cbc1abb3d928609e100 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: cassie Date: Thu, 28 Aug 2025 01:30:52 -0400 Subject: [PATCH] vault backup: 2025-08-28 01:30:49 --- .obsidian/workspace.json | 43 +- .../posts/An Empty Promise to Blog More.md | 14 + ...ere’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md | 115 +++++ content/posts/Women in a Sea of Men.md | 50 ++ content/week-notes/030.md | 3 + .../an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html | 126 +++++ .../index.html | 189 ++++++++ public/index.xml | 23 +- .../an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html | 114 +++++ public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis/index.html | 110 +++++ .../index.html | 110 +++++ public/posts/index.html | 30 +- public/posts/index.xml | 21 + public/posts/page/2/index.html | 30 +- public/posts/page/3/index.html | 30 +- public/posts/page/4/index.html | 26 +- public/posts/page/5/index.html | 26 +- public/posts/page/6/index.html | 50 +- public/posts/page/7/index.html | 200 ++++---- public/posts/page/8/index.html | 161 ++++-- public/posts/page/9/index.html | 458 ++++++++++++++++++ public/sitemap.xml | 13 +- public/tags/ai/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/audio/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/exercise/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/games/index.html | 4 +- public/tags/home/index.html | 4 +- public/tags/index.html | 4 +- public/tags/index.xml | 16 +- public/tags/internet/index.html | 6 +- public/tags/life/index.html | 30 +- public/tags/literature/index.html | 10 +- public/tags/media-log/index.html | 6 +- public/tags/meta/index.html | 10 +- public/tags/metsa/index.html | 109 +++++ public/tags/metsa/index.xml | 19 + public/tags/movies/index.html | 9 +- public/tags/movies/index.xml | 9 +- public/tags/music/index.html | 12 +- public/tags/podcasting/index.html | 4 +- public/tags/pokemon/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/politics/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/prompts/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/star-wars/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/teaching/index.html | 8 +- public/tags/television/index.html | 2 +- public/tags/undergrad/index.html | 4 +- public/tags/wordpress/index.html | 21 +- public/tags/wordpress/index.xml | 9 +- public/week-notes/030/index.html | 12 +- .../index.html | 149 ++++++ 51 files changed, 2154 insertions(+), 259 deletions(-) create mode 100644 content/posts/An Empty Promise to Blog More.md create mode 100644 content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md create mode 100644 content/posts/Women in a Sea of Men.md create mode 100644 public/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html create mode 100644 public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html create mode 100644 public/posts/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html create mode 100644 public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis/index.html create mode 100644 public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html create mode 100644 public/posts/page/9/index.html create mode 100644 public/tags/metsa/index.html create mode 100644 public/tags/metsa/index.xml create mode 100644 public/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/index.html diff --git a/.obsidian/workspace.json b/.obsidian/workspace.json index 28bff2d..b6534c8 100644 --- a/.obsidian/workspace.json +++ b/.obsidian/workspace.json @@ -4,22 +4,22 @@ "type": "split", "children": [ { - "id": "6e69f397eb4530d0", + "id": "890c645b15b2b0a4", "type": "tabs", "children": [ { - "id": "3582b477c6bf6674", + "id": "242ed0fe849fd2d4", "type": "leaf", "state": { "type": "markdown", "state": { - "file": "content/week-notes/030.md", + "file": "content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md", "mode": "source", "source": false, "backlinks": false }, "icon": "lucide-file", - "title": "030" + "title": "Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020" } } ] @@ -182,8 +182,23 @@ "obsidian-git:Open Git source control": false } }, - "active": "3582b477c6bf6674", + "active": "242ed0fe849fd2d4", "lastOpenFiles": [ + "content/week-notes/030.md", + "content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md", + "public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html", + "public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020", + "public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html", + "public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020", + "public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis/index.html", + "public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis", + "public/posts/page/9/index.html", + "public/posts/page/9", + "content/posts/An Empty Promise to Blog More.md", + "public/tags/metsa/index.xml", + "public/tags/metsa/index.html", + "content/posts/Women in a Sea of Men.md", + "content/posts/an ode to gitsync.md", "content/week-notes/021.md", "content/week-notes/022.md", "content/week-notes/023.md", @@ -193,20 +208,9 @@ "content/week-notes/027.md", "content/week-notes/028.md", "content/week-notes/029.md", - "content/week-notes/030.md", "content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2015.md", - "public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/index.html", - "public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015", - "public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/index.html", - "public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015", "content/posts/Automattic's Write Brief AI is, unsurprisingly, full of shit.md", "content/posts/Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together.md", - "public/week-notes/030/index.html", - "public/week-notes/030", - "public/tags/star-wars/index.xml", - "public/tags/star-wars/index.html", - "public/tags/star-wars", - "public/tags/movies/index.xml", "content/posts/Life is Strange Episode 1 Chrysalis.md", "content/posts/turning 30.md", "content/posts/Revolutions.md", @@ -214,11 +218,6 @@ "content/posts/Princess Bubblegum & Marceline Still Just Almost Girlfriends.md", "content/posts/House of Leaves Appendix II-E, The Three Attic Whalestoe Institute Letters (May 8th, 1987).md", "conflict-files-obsidian-git.md", - "content/posts/Intentional Listening.md", - "content/posts/Using Hugo to generate a podcast feed.md", - "content/posts/2025-08-11.md", - "content/posts/test.md", - "content/templates/(week notes N).md", - "content/week-notes/025 unused.md" + "content/posts/Intentional Listening.md" ] } \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/content/posts/An Empty Promise to Blog More.md b/content/posts/An Empty Promise to Blog More.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2012a19 --- /dev/null +++ b/content/posts/An Empty Promise to Blog More.md @@ -0,0 +1,14 @@ +--- +title: An Empty Promise to Blog More +date: 2023-06-30 +url: an-empty-promise-to-blog-more +tags: + - wordpress + - meta +draft: false +--- +This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything). + +I have channeled these ruminations into redesigning my blog for the eight hundredth time, but this time, I am also resolving to use it more. I have thoughts I like to share and a desire to catalogue the things I am interested in, and it just doesn't seem viable any more to do so on any online platforms that I don't own. I feel, in a sense, "homeless" on the internet, and I think it is time we make those homes on ground that won't be pulled out from under us with the passing whimsy of a manchild CEO. (In case there is any ambiguity, I am indeed referring to Elon Musk and Steve Huffman.) + +Will I follow through on that promise? We'll see. In the past, I have been caught up in the idea that this blog should be for long-form posts with deep thinking and planning. Maybe that should still be true, but I also want to embrace the passing whimsy and interests that occupy my time. Thanks for reading and joining me on the ride. \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md b/content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1145443 --- /dev/null +++ b/content/posts/Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020.md @@ -0,0 +1,115 @@ +--- +title: Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020 +date: 2020-12-30 +url: heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020 +tags: + - music + - wordpress +draft: false +cover: https://cdn.cassie.ink/images/2020/mac.jpg +--- +It feels like most of my blog posts end up being about music. I’d like to pretend that this post is a piece of an annual tradition in which I review and analyze my listening patterns from the past year, but truth be told, I’ve [only done this once before, in 2015](https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/), and then [kind of early in 2020, when I reviewed my favorite albums from the last ten years](https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/). Truth is, I’d like this to be a tradition, a habit I develop, but I’ve had about as much success with that as I have with my resolution to exercise more regularly. + +I don’t need to explain that 2020 has been a unique year. If I put on my English major bullshitting hat, I can maybe postulate that I write about music in the years that music was especially important to me. In 2015, music was the backdrop of my first (and current) serious, long-term relationship. I exchanged stolen moments and mix CDs, so the music I was listening to at that time became a sense-memory trigger, a nostalgic sound that brought me back to first kisses and early butterflies. And when I wrote about my favorite albums released from 2010 to 2019, I was making sense of my teenage years — the music that comforted me, changed me, channeled me. It only seems natural then to write about the music in this weird, mixed up year, because quarantine has made a process that’s usually internal for me — listening to and thinking about music — more weighty, more important. I’ve had more time to focus on media like music because there’s not much else to do. I’m spending more time alone in front of my computer than any person normally should. My screen time (which means music time) this past year has probably rivalled the internet addiction of my teen years. + +I’ve also used these posts to discuss _how_ I listen to music in some way. Sparked by the shutdown of Google Play Music, which was my preferred way to sync my massive music library to my phone, I moved over to Plex and the Plexamp mobile app. It thankfully offers excellent last.fm support, so I continued scrobbling there, but I didn’t set it up until a few weeks into my Plex journey — so a lot of play counts are probably lower than they should be. Still, the numbers paint an accurate picture, even if the exact details are muddy. + +That all said, let’s get to the wheat and away from the chaff. Here’s the list of music I was listening to in 2020 that wasn’t necessarily released in 2020. + +## Mac Miller (1469 plays) +> Movin' so fast the clock look slow +> +> Water my seeds 'til the flowers grow +> +> Love so much that my heart get broke +> +> I don't really know how the normal shit go +> +> *– Mac Miller, "Wings"* + +When I [wrote about _Swimming_ last year](https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/#swimming), I was cautious. I knew it was an important album and that it was a gateway for me. I knew there were some phenomenal tracks and impressive flows. A year later, I’m much more effusive in my praise (and critical of the songs I listed as the best — I did not appreciate “Wings” or “Dunno” as they deserve). I’ve moved from my “mac miller songs i think i like but idk” playlist to one titled “i need to listen to something other than mac miller,” partly at my boyfriend’s request, because I truly didn’t listen to much other than Easy Mac with the cheesy raps this year. + +Part of the appeal of Mac Miller’s music is the variation in his discography and skillset. His abstract jazz EP _You_, for example, is bookended by the experimental, depressive _Macadelic_, released eight months prior, and _Watching Movies with the Sound Off_, which is perhaps his strongest rap album released (rivaled perhaps by _GO:OD AM_, but that’s a conversation for folks who know way more about rap than me to debate). It’s unfortunate that Mac’s career lasted as little time as it did, cut short by his death in 2018, but he produced an incredible amount in that time — and much of it has yet to see the light of day. There are days I’m looking for early career Mac, the _Blue Slide Park_ and _Best Day Ever_ era, when the world was before him and he was ready (and excited to) conquer it; there are days when the smooth romanticism of _Circles_ and _The Divine Feminine_ are appealing; and there are days when I need the emotional catharsis of his more complicated releases, like _Faces_ or _Swimming_ — two very different releases, but releases that reflected on the complications of fame, depression, and addiction. It is remarkable that one artist who died so young gave the world so much. + +Unsurprisingly, my top track from this past year was by Mac: “God is Fair, Sexy Nasty (feat. Kendrick Lamar)” (65 plays) from 2016’s _The Divine Feminine_. I listened to this song on repeat on my drives to work (back when I was driving to work) in late-2019 into 2020. I memorized every line. The song is a beautiful marriage of the soulful elements of love and the physical side — the sexy and the nasty. It’s a tremendously fun song with layered production and samples, and while I skip it most of the time, the outro of Miller’s grandmother reflecting on her late husband is a goofy but earnest addition that, when considered among all of _TDF_, yearns for a long love, an old love, where one’s partner completes and complements them over decades of companionship (“We gon’ keep going ’til our bones both break / It’s the grown folk way”). + +I did dive into the unreleased leaked tracks by Mac this year, too. It’s a complicated, controversial subject, because it’s unclear whether these songs have been obtained through nefarious means, and friends of Mac’s have said that the leaks [have made things difficult for the late rapper’s family](https://www.reddit.com/r/MacMiller/comments/iyfj37/an_end_to_the_music_request_thread_posting_leaks/). But so many of these songs need to be heard — they show Mac at his most vulnerable in songs like the beautiful, tragic “Pure” (40 plays), where he raps a letter to himself, reflecting on his material success, drug use, and emotional health (“Everybody got opinions when you make millions / All God’s children, let me keep livin’ / I been keepin’ it real / I can’t sleep without pills … I been dealing with some problems, I been longing for your love / Crazy selfish doing drugs / Check off all of the above”). + +Everything about Mac’s music speaks to a need. A need, for him, to share the world in his head; to find his way out of the darkness. It’s difficult to reconcile the wound of his death; the leaks are a band aid, but there’s something bittersweet in hearing him spit about the addiction that killed him. I find ways to push that reminder out, but many of his songs are steeped in the awareness that his lifestyle would kill him (“Am I okay? / Fuck no / Just so nutso / I need to let the drugs go / I try to find heaven, I get high but never come close”). But we can at least appreciate the beauty he was able to put in the world when he was here. I sometimes feel guilty listening to songs like “Pure” because Mac may have never intended for anyone but him to hear them. It feels wrong to intrude on that, but as “Oracle” (12 plays) concludes, “the people need to hear the music.” + +**Top & Notable Tracks:** [“God is Fair, Sexy Nasty (feat. Kendrick Lamar)”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1F6zIO_QMTc) (65 plays), “Do You Have a Destination?” (54 plays), [“In the Air”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuBrnShHuR0) (47 plays), [“Thoughts from a Balcony”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxufWf7dEcM) (44 plays), [“Dunno”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61Lmk2k542k) (41 plays), “Pure” (40 plays), [“Wedding”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3elAONl3jY) (39 plays), [“Wings”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_O1qD95xnao) (28 plays) +___ +## Martha (283 plays) +It is no secret that I am an avid indie rock fan, and Martha was my sojourn in that world. When Bandcamp Fridays first started up, Martha offered their entire discography plus a bonus album of demos for a discounted price. I jumped on it purely on the knowledge that they had toured with Los Campesinos! a few years back. I was not disappointed. Martha’s music is uncomplicated fun, with the breathlessness and, at times, incoherency of early Cloud Nothings. They shine with absolute bops like [“Clatty Harriet”](https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/clatty-harriet) and the bright optimism of [“Wrestlemania VIII”](https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/wrestlemania-viii) (“It’s like a cloud was hanging over me until the day we texted for the first time / And the world just got a little brighter”) and [“Six Men Getting Sick Six Times (Mendable)”](https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/six-men-getting-sick-six-times-mendable) (“There’s a world outside where I feel so broken / But you make me feel mendable”). + +There’s an effortlessness and easy appeal to Martha’s music. It’s inoffensive, in a good way — you know exactly what you’ll get with Martha and they deliver on your every want and expectation. Martha is an easy recommendation to make because just about everyone will like Martha. Martha sounds like a fun group of friends got together to make fun indie rock. In 2020, I needed that. + +**Top & Notable Tracks:** [“1967, I Miss You, I’m Lonely”](https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/1967-i-miss-you-im-lonely) (17 plays), [“Six Men Getting Sick Six Times (Mendable)”](https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/six-men-getting-sick-six-times-mendable) (15 plays), [“Clatty Harriet”](https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/clatty-harriet) (13 plays), [“Heart is Healing”](https://bsmrocks.bandcamp.com/track/heart-is-healing) (6 plays) +___ +## Trust Fund (180 plays) +Trust Fund again lends itself to my love of indie rock. I’m pretty sure I also discovered them through the Los Campesinos! tour connection — but even before that, I began listening to The Peripheral Ones, a cover band for The Middle Ones that [I have previously evangelized](https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/#chants). The Peripheral Ones led me to Pigthe, who surprisingly did not chart in my top ten this year, and a month or so later, I started listening to Trust Fund. It wasn’t until a few years later that I learned that the mastermind behind Pigthe is also the guitarist in Trust Fund. + +Trust Fund therefore offers a similar sound to what I love in The Peripheral Ones: a bedroom rock group with an intimate yet catchy sound. I’m not sure when — if it was in 2020 at all, because time is an illusion — but at some point, I purchased Trust Fund’s entire discography, too, this time based off of my love of [“Cut Me Out”](https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/cut-me-out) from _No one’s coming for us_. At some point this year, in my unsuccessful attempts to listen to more than just Mac Miller, I put my entire 97GB music library on shuffle to find some underappreciated gems. This turned up a few Trust Fund songs, which I placed on the aptly named “songs in my library that i genuinely have never heard” playlist. This included such gems as “we’re thirteen (and we’re drinking) and “Abundant” among a few others. + +!["songs in my library that i genuinely have never heard"](https://cdn.cassie.ink/images/2020/playlist.png) + +The playlist ended up composed more of a Trust Fund shuffle than full music library, admittedly. While this anecdote maybe speaks more to my goblin-like hoarding of music than my fondness for Trust Fund, these are the kinds of connections and discoveries I live for. I love stumbling upon something new, something saved long ago that ended up becoming relevant again years later. Trust Fund did that, and they were able to stick more than a few songs and hooks in my head this year (“I’m alone in the house / and I’m freaking myself out again / I’m clapping my hands and I’m spinning my arms around”). They’re just _catchy_. + +**Top & Notable Tracks:** [“we’ll both apologize”](https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/well-both-apologise) (35 plays), [“Dreamers (Stefano Guitar Demo)”](https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/dreamers-stefano-guitar-demo) (32 plays), [“Sadness (demo)”](https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/sadness-demo) (32 plays), [“we’re thirteen and we’re drinking”](https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/were-thirteen-and-were-drinking) (32 plays), [“Abundant”](https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/abundant) (28 plays) +___ +## Aether (175 plays) +Aether is the moniker of Diego Chavez who, in brief, creates awesome downtempo hip-hop instrumentals. I first stumbled upon his music in 2013, when I scrobbled his album _Artifacts_ (2008) an impressive 542 times. This was around the time that I was on the computer near constantly and liked downtempo hip-hop as my background working and writing music (shouts out to Emancipator and Little People, who also fall into this category). I more or less forgot completely about Aether until this year, when [“Caparra,”](https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/caparra) an old favorite, popped up in a shuffle. I thought to myself, “why not find out what this guy has been up to in the last seven years?” + +As it turns out, he’s done a bit — Chavez has a [Soundcloud](https://soundcloud.com/aether) where he occasionally posts tracks. But because I’m old now and don’t fully understand Soundcloud, I decided to snag his 2014 release, _Solace_. I was absolutely blown away by the title track (and first song on the album), and I listened to it on repeat for more than a while this year. The rest of the songs on the album are also great, but they blend together — which isn’t necessarily bad for working music. “Solace,” though, is the standout and deserves to have the album named after it. It’s incredible — the catchy, consistent beat, the abstract melodies, the skittering vocal sample all coalesce into a beautiful breakdown around the two-and-a-half-minute mark. It’s an absolute dream of a track that slowly builds then delivers. + +**Top & Notable Tracks:** [“Solace”](https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/solace) (12 plays), [“Untouched”](https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/untouched) (8 plays), [“Tomorrow’s Thief”](https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/tomorrows-thief) (8 plays) +___ +## Tokyo Police Club (131 plays) +I was listening to Tokyo Police Club demos on my iPod Nano back in 2009 — that’s how far back my relationship with TPC stretches. Another indie darling, I’ve enjoyed the group for some time now, but they dropped off my radar for a few years. This past year, however, one of the many shows I re-binge-watched was _Gossip Girl_, which features “Bambi” in an episode. It has a delicious and catchy guitar riff that shines through the Chuck Bass melodrama, and I was pleased when I realized the song was by a band I already liked. I went back and downloaded 2010’s _Champ_ after this discovery and kept it on play for a few weeks. + +_Champ_ is not a big departure from my past affairs with Tokyo Police Club — I was most familiar with _Elephant Shell_, which released two years prior. _Champ_ features the same clean, catchy sound, but tightened up a bit. It retains the fun, catchy sound from _Elephant Shell_ but matures and adds definition. Funnily enough, [the 10th anniversary edition was announced in early December](https://www.pastemagazine.com/music/tokyo-police-club/tokyo-police-club-announce-champ-anniversary/) and will release in March of 2021. The list of bonus tracks is impressive — maybe _Champ_ will make my list again next year. + +**Top & Notable Tracks:** [“Bambi”](https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/bambi) (17 plays), [“Favourite Food”](https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/favourite-food) (12 plays), [“Breakneck Speed”](https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/breakneck-speed) (8 plays), [“Not Sick”](https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/not-sick) (13 plays) +___ +## Jean Dawson (104 plays) +Jean Dawson is an artist who made me feel _old_ this year. + +After seeing Dawson described as “glitch pop,” I knew I had to find his 2020 release, _Pixel Bath_. Unfortunately, Dawson is in this new artist milieu who seem to release their music only on streaming services and vinyl — so if you’re like me and avoid services like Spotify or Apple Music, you’ll be hard pressed to find a way to actually legitimately pay for a digital download. I forgive Dawson because it seems he is interpedently releasing music under his own label, but there are old people out there (me) who like to have digital copies of their music (me again). + +Anyway, Pixel Bath is a more recent addition to my library, but I’m loving it. It mixes so many different genres — hip-hop, rap, R&B, powerpop, glitch pop (which is apparently a genre) — in a cascade of sounds and styles. It’s an absolute joy to listen to, with some stand out bangers like “POWER FREAKS” and “Policia.” The former is a favorite of mine, luring you in with a slow, repeated melody until it rushes in with high power, fast rhymes that reflect on the experience of young black men watched by the police. _Pixel Bath_ is filled with unapologetic, boyish, raucous energy, like a paintball match that uses a Gameboy Color soundfont and speaks to Dawson’s experiences as a mixed-Black and Mexican teenager in the US. It’s an important album and a fun album. + +**Top & Notable Tracks:** [“POWER FREAKS”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CB5BzBNKYY) (20 plays), [“Pyrotechnics”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUWKZLxopCg) (17 plays), [“BRUISEBOY”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elSZfsrjOxQ) (12 plays), [“Policia”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrLRpQCt1yI) (12 plays), [“Starface*”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3hYjI3UnEY)(12 plays), [“Devilish”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoGhwUxSmTc) (10 plays), [“CLEAR BONES”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYUiCP3eMAA) (8 plays), [“Triple Double (feat. A$AP ROCKY)”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmPdsM6gyGw) (7 plays) +___ +## Honorable Mentions +Those were some of my top, new (to me) artists for the year, but there a few songs I would be remiss not to mention for my 2020 compilation. + +**["celine" by shypig](https://shypig.bandcamp.com/track/celine) (56 plays)** + +This is one of the songs that I’m not totally sure _how_ I found — I think it was from associated acts with Trust Fund and Pigthe — but I’m so glad I did. Unfortunately, there’s very little information to be found about shypig online — their Bandcamp bio helpfully explains that they are “a shy pig.” “celine” is a dark, mysterious, angsty track that absolutely rips. It haunted me for days, with its cryptic lyrics and obsessive atmosphere. It’s befitting of the _RIP everyone_ album title, at least, and something about shypig’s elusive nature adds to the darkness of “celine.” + +**"Get Away" by The Internet (46 plays)** + +I found The Internet through Mac Miller, as they acted as his backing band for _Live from Space_ — as a group, The Internet have released lots of smooth grooves befitting of a jazz lounge. Those tracks haven’t grabbed me, though I can appreciate them for what they are, but “Get Away,” particularly the version [from their Tiny Desk Concert](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6j49uzPugA), is absolutely phenomenal. It’s simple and pared back compared to [the album release](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z32HJ7PHnKY), which allows The Internet to inject some of their typical groove into the dark beat of the original. Both are absolute bops, but the Tiny Desk version has a lightness and humor to it that I relished. + +**"Ring Ring (feat. Clever)" by Juice WRLD (17 plays)** + +Juice WRLD probably would have charted higher on my list if I’d started listening to him earlier in the year — he snuck into my library in mid-December, and I’ve been working my way through his discography since then. “Ring Ring” is a catchy jam that I keep returning to. Like with Mac Miller, Juice WRLD can be difficult to listen to — “Ring Ring” is a bittersweet song when considered in the context of Juice’s death, but I’ve found a way to shake that off and appreciate the music left behind, not the tragic cap on the end of it. + +**"I'll Believe in Anything" by Wolf Parade (25 plays)** + +This is another song I’ve stumbled upon in a bizarre web of unintended musical connections. I found this song through reddit — some Ask Reddit thread I think where folks were recommending songs — and fell in love with it. But there was something familiar to the vocals — come to find that it was Spencer Krug, who originally recorded and released the song under his Sunset Rubdown moniker, a band I’ve been listening to for years. The Wolf Parade version is inarguably superior, as it’s a fully fleshed out track. “I’ll Believe in Anything” is a song about love — about keeping hope alive, about fighting for and finding happiness. It offered a lightness I scarcely found in 2020, a reminder of the things that keep me strong and the things that bond us all together. It’s a beautiful song. + +> We've both been very brave +> +> Walk around with both legs +> +> Fight the scary day +> +> We both pull tricks out of our sleeves +> +> But I'll believe in anything +> +> And you'll believe in anything +> +> *– Wolf Parade, "I'll Believe in Anything"* + diff --git a/content/posts/Women in a Sea of Men.md b/content/posts/Women in a Sea of Men.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..03d35bc --- /dev/null +++ b/content/posts/Women in a Sea of Men.md @@ -0,0 +1,50 @@ +--- +title: "Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl" +date: 2016-09-28 +url: women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl +tags: + - movies + - wordpress +draft: false +cover: https://cdn.cassie.ink/images/2016/scream.jpg +--- +Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: _Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl_, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women. + +## Congratulations, Pirates: You Did the Absolute Least You Possibly Could +A handful of women in appear in _The Curse of the Black Pearl_, only one of whom boasts a significant role in the film. Keira Knightley plays Elizabeth Swann, the female lead and romantic interest of early-noughties dreamboat Orlando Bloom, best known for his turn as Legolas in _The Lord of the Rings_, possessor of elf-eyes and occasional gay lover to the hotter, more rugged Aragorn (disclaimer: I have not read much Tolkien). A pre-blue alien CGI and green alien body paint Zoë Saldana pops up as Anamaria roughly a third of the way into the film, a member of Jack Sparrow’s (Johnny Depp) ragtag crew. Her name is mentioned approximately once. The remaining named women are Estrella, Elizabeth’s maid, who appears in a brief scene (no more than a few minutes), along with Scarlett and Giselle, who are implied to have had sex with Johnny Depp’s character. + +While the latter three women exist, albeit as extremely minor characters, their presence can hardly be considered exceptional, as they are either servants or sex objects. That said, with a count of four named women compared to at least twice that of men, the film nonetheless coasts by the first criteria of the Bechdel-Wallace test: to include at least two named female characters. + +The sole scene involving two women conversing with one another is the aforementioned scene with Estrella, when she chats with Elizabeth. _The Curse of the Black Pearl_ thus passes the second criteria of the Bechdel-Wallace test (to have two women speak to each other), but the subject of their conversation leads to the film’s ultimate failure. + +Estrella and Elizabeth chat about the latter’s impending engagement to Commodore Norrington, a man. The two women gab about it being a “lucky match,” given the Commodore’s high-ranking within society, but Elizabeth balks, in part because her fiancé-to-be tragically resembles Nicholas Cage, and also because she is in secret love with Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), a common blacksmith. The film therefore implies some sort of female friendship, as Estrella and Elizabeth are in close enough confidence for Estrella to know Elizabeth’s heart. However, Elizabeth dismisses Estrella for speaking out of turn (code for speaking to her while being a Filthy Poor), the power dynamic ceasing any sort of meaningful conversation about hierarchies of power, gender, and class, reducing their conversation to the mere romantic gossip of the day. + +> So we’re all men of our word really… Except for, of course, Elizabeth, who is, in fact, a woman, and therefore has nothing interesting or valuable to say. +> +> – Captain Jack Sparrow + +The limited nature of this conversation is unfortunate considering how easily it could have been elevated. Elizabeth’s rejection of traditional norms and values within the film isn’t limited to just her romantic choices (though that’s certainly the focus of her plotline) but also her fascination with the forbidden world of pirates. Elizabeth chiding Estrella for forgetting her place seems particularly out of character in this context too, as the audience is meant to understand Elizabeth as not only resistant to the structures of power but also as compassionate to the lower-class. Her shutting down the conversation may have been a mere attempt by her to avoid admitting her feelings for Will, but plays out more like the movie not wanting to waste time with the conversations of women and fleshing out Elizabeth’s character. This potential sits just below the film’s waters, but the filmmakers fail to surface it. + +This repudiation of society by Elizabeth remains present in the film, but mostly exists within the context of her romance with Will. She jaunts around with Jack Sparrow and outsmarts several pirates, but she is also subject to their sexual harassment, stemming not only from her captors (oh yeah — Elizabeth acts as the damsel in distress for much of the film) but also from Jack. Regarding the latter, his harassment of Elizabeth is played not to be disturbing but for the audience’s humor and enjoyment, like when Sparrow asks if Elizabeth might be hiding something in her bodice, gazes at her chest, and remarks that it’s unlikely given the size. + +The film thus attempts to endear the audience to Sparrow by way of objectifying and mocking Elizabeth. It seems a particularly ill-conceived joke as well considering that part of Keira Knightley’s daily makeup session for the film was a whooping 45 minutes dedicated to making her breasts look larger and to give her what she calls “[the cleavage effect](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-517780/The-secret-flat-chested-Keira-buxom-pirate-girl.html).” She described the experience positively in that same interview with the Daily Mail in February of 2008: + +> They painted my tits on me for the films, which is extraordinary because it’s kind of a dying art form – in the past, they used to have whole sections of the studios devoted to bosom make-up… And I loved it, completely loved it. Because it was the first time in my life I had big tits, and I didn’t even need surgery. + +While women are free to choose to have breast augmentation surgeries or employ other methods of making their chests look fuller, we must question from where the desire stems. Tabloids and media have scrutinized Knightley’s body all through her career, criticizing her thin frame. Filmmakers and advertisers have deemed her body as something needing to be changed, like when her breasts were digitally edited in promotional material for her 2004 film King Arthur. By July of 2008, just a few months after the interview about _Pirates_, Knightley [took a stand](http://www.afterellen.com/general-news/35471-dont-touch-keira-knightleys-breasts): while she perhaps hadn’t cared in the past, she did now. She refused any makeup or Photoshop tricks to “enhance” her chest for her 2008 film, _The Duchess_, citing her pride and comfort in her body. A gorgeous, slender woman like Knightley — with fame to boot — of course has a degree of privilege in the complicated world of body image, as she more or less represents the ideal constantly presented to women. However, her stance against altering her natural appearance for the male gaze remains notable, especially when analyzing the first _Pirates_ film: while Elizabeth might quip about corsets, the film’s rebellion against contemporary beauty standards and progressive attitude towards women remains completely superficial. The film continues to perpetuate the very standards it pretends to diverge against. + +To return to the treatment of Elizabeth’s character by other characters in the film, in another scene, Elizabeth infamously burns a cache of alcohol to create a signal fire when she and Jack have been marooned on an island. Lamenting his now forced sobriety, Jack quips, “there’ll be no living with her after this,” his personal twist on the delightful aphorism “women, can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em.” The truth in his jest is that a determined woman like Elizabeth (Jack is content to waste away on the island) cannot be borne unless one is intoxicated. + +In the final battle of the movie, Elizabeth appears in a solider’s coat and pants; her dress was soaked and she had to change for decency and to avoid pneumonia (despite that the many men in the film are constantly drenched — the implication here being that women are more delicate). It’s a refreshing change from the corsets and large dresses she spends the rest of the film in (though she returns to them by the film’s end), but the shots with Knightley in the costume are short and easy to miss in all the action. She barely participates in the fight and almost never without the assistance of a man, usually Will. The conception of her character may point to a progressive portrayal of a woman, but utterly fails in execution; the filmmakers want to have their cake and eat it too. They mock corsets but seemingly agree with their purpose. + +![Elizabeth in pants](https://cdn.cassie.ink/images/2016/pirates.jpg) + + +Anamaria too represents wasted potential in _Pirates of the_ _Caribbean_, an opportunity to elevate the film’s inclusion of women beyond servants and sex objects. A fully realized character for Anamaria would have been especially notable as it would feature a woman of color in a non-sexualized, non-servile role. In her first scene, Anamaria admonishes Jack for his owing her a ship, implying a swashbuckling or sailing history on her part. But after she is established as part of Jack’s ragtag crew, she appears only in the background and speaks only to confirm her orders from Jack Sparrow or the first-mate, Gibbs. A woman’s presence on a ship in the era of course would have been notable, and Anamaria could have been an interesting counterpart for Elizabeth — inspiration to ultimately commit to a life as a pirate — as well as an interesting character in her own right. Once again, however, the movies see fit to not spend their time on such a plotline, let alone on allowing these two women to interact. + +## I Have Exactly One Emotion, Ever, and It Is "Disappointed" +_Pirates of the_ _Caribbean_ at least makes some effort to include women and bandies interesting directions and back stories for them but fails to translate them into anything substantial. It certainly had opportunity to, with many critics agreeing that scenes in the film ran long and could have been edited down significantly, as well as much of the plot’s back-and-forth reduced. That time could instead have been dedicated to developing these interesting characters, rather than the repetitive antics of inconsequential pirates. Yes, it’s a movie about pirates; they’re literally in the title. But why can’t women be those pirates? Why can’t they be a major part of the action, without having to be helped, rescued, or protected? Why can’t they exist without being madonnas, whores, servants, or scorned women?` + +I lack clear recollections of the franchise’s later films, though most agree that their quality deteriorates after the second film. From what I do remember, they fail to add many more female characters to the mix, though Elizabeth remains in at least the next two, and she is presumably given more to do than be rescued by Will (hopefully). _The Curse of the Black Pearl_ passes only the first two criterion of the Bechdel-Wallace test, but the test itself represents an ankle-high bar that, sadly, most films continue to trip over, _Pirates of the Caribbean_ included. +___ +_I originally wrote this for an assignment in a Diversity & Education course; I have modified the tone and expanded the content for this blog._ \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/content/week-notes/030.md b/content/week-notes/030.md index f6455b2..b8b7ff0 100644 --- a/content/week-notes/030.md +++ b/content/week-notes/030.md @@ -13,6 +13,9 @@ For context, the college I'm teaching (*adjunct lecturing*[^2]) at is my alma m I've been to my classroom a few times this week getting some of the bigger projects done. I'll have time to put on finishing touches on the teacher conference days next week, but I'd rather cut open 96 tennis balls at a relaxed pace than rush to do it the day before kids show up. Site-wise, I'm continuing to backport content from an old blog. This week I've added... +* [An Empty Promise to Blog More](https://cassie.ink/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/) (06-30-2023) +* [Here's What I was Listening to in 2020](https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/) (12-30-2020) +* [Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl](https://cassie.ink/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/) (09-28-2016) * [Here's What I Was Listening to in 2015](https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015) (01-07-2016) * [Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together](http://cassie.ink/star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together/) (12-14-2015) ## Reading diff --git a/public/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html b/public/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2c6fca8 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,126 @@ + + + + + + + + + +An Empty Promise to Blog More | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + +
+

+ + cassie + + ink + +

+ + + + +
+
+ +
+ + + +

An Empty Promise to Blog More

+ +
+ an-empty-promise-to-blog-more +
+ + + +

This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).

+

I have channeled these ruminations into redesigning my blog for the eight hundredth time, but this time, I am also resolving to use it more. I have thoughts I like to share and a desire to catalogue the things I am interested in, and it just doesn’t seem viable any more to do so on any online platforms that I don’t own. I feel, in a sense, “homeless” on the internet, and I think it is time we make those homes on ground that won’t be pulled out from under us with the passing whimsy of a manchild CEO. (In case there is any ambiguity, I am indeed referring to Elon Musk and Steve Huffman.)

+

Will I follow through on that promise? We’ll see. In the past, I have been caught up in the idea that this blog should be for long-form posts with deep thinking and planning. Maybe that should still be true, but I also want to embrace the passing whimsy and interests that occupy my time. Thanks for reading and joining me on the ride.

+ + + +
+ +
+ +
+ + +
+ + + diff --git a/public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html b/public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..04a2153 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,189 @@ + + + + + + + + + +Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020 | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + +
+

+ + cassie + + ink + +

+ + + + +
+
+ +
+ + + +

Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020

+ +
+ heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020 +
+ + +
+ + +

It feels like most of my blog posts end up being about music. I’d like to pretend that this post is a piece of an annual tradition in which I review and analyze my listening patterns from the past year, but truth be told, I’ve only done this once before, in 2015, and then kind of early in 2020, when I reviewed my favorite albums from the last ten years. Truth is, I’d like this to be a tradition, a habit I develop, but I’ve had about as much success with that as I have with my resolution to exercise more regularly.

+

I don’t need to explain that 2020 has been a unique year. If I put on my English major bullshitting hat, I can maybe postulate that I write about music in the years that music was especially important to me. In 2015, music was the backdrop of my first (and current) serious, long-term relationship. I exchanged stolen moments and mix CDs, so the music I was listening to at that time became a sense-memory trigger, a nostalgic sound that brought me back to first kisses and early butterflies. And when I wrote about my favorite albums released from 2010 to 2019, I was making sense of my teenage years — the music that comforted me, changed me, channeled me. It only seems natural then to write about the music in this weird, mixed up year, because quarantine has made a process that’s usually internal for me — listening to and thinking about music — more weighty, more important. I’ve had more time to focus on media like music because there’s not much else to do. I’m spending more time alone in front of my computer than any person normally should. My screen time (which means music time) this past year has probably rivalled the internet addiction of my teen years.

+

I’ve also used these posts to discuss how I listen to music in some way. Sparked by the shutdown of Google Play Music, which was my preferred way to sync my massive music library to my phone, I moved over to Plex and the Plexamp mobile app. It thankfully offers excellent last.fm support, so I continued scrobbling there, but I didn’t set it up until a few weeks into my Plex journey — so a lot of play counts are probably lower than they should be. Still, the numbers paint an accurate picture, even if the exact details are muddy.

+

That all said, let’s get to the wheat and away from the chaff. Here’s the list of music I was listening to in 2020 that wasn’t necessarily released in 2020.

+

Mac Miller (1469 plays)

+
+

Movin’ so fast the clock look slow

+

Water my seeds ’til the flowers grow

+

Love so much that my heart get broke

+

I don’t really know how the normal shit go

+

– Mac Miller, “Wings”

+

When I wrote about Swimming last year, I was cautious. I knew it was an important album and that it was a gateway for me. I knew there were some phenomenal tracks and impressive flows. A year later, I’m much more effusive in my praise (and critical of the songs I listed as the best — I did not appreciate “Wings” or “Dunno” as they deserve). I’ve moved from my “mac miller songs i think i like but idk” playlist to one titled “i need to listen to something other than mac miller,” partly at my boyfriend’s request, because I truly didn’t listen to much other than Easy Mac with the cheesy raps this year.

+

Part of the appeal of Mac Miller’s music is the variation in his discography and skillset. His abstract jazz EP You, for example, is bookended by the experimental, depressive Macadelic, released eight months prior, and Watching Movies with the Sound Off, which is perhaps his strongest rap album released (rivaled perhaps by GO:OD AM, but that’s a conversation for folks who know way more about rap than me to debate). It’s unfortunate that Mac’s career lasted as little time as it did, cut short by his death in 2018, but he produced an incredible amount in that time — and much of it has yet to see the light of day. There are days I’m looking for early career Mac, the Blue Slide Park and Best Day Ever era, when the world was before him and he was ready (and excited to) conquer it; there are days when the smooth romanticism of Circles and The Divine Feminine are appealing; and there are days when I need the emotional catharsis of his more complicated releases, like Faces or Swimming — two very different releases, but releases that reflected on the complications of fame, depression, and addiction. It is remarkable that one artist who died so young gave the world so much.

+

Unsurprisingly, my top track from this past year was by Mac: “God is Fair, Sexy Nasty (feat. Kendrick Lamar)” (65 plays) from 2016’s The Divine Feminine. I listened to this song on repeat on my drives to work (back when I was driving to work) in late-2019 into 2020. I memorized every line. The song is a beautiful marriage of the soulful elements of love and the physical side — the sexy and the nasty. It’s a tremendously fun song with layered production and samples, and while I skip it most of the time, the outro of Miller’s grandmother reflecting on her late husband is a goofy but earnest addition that, when considered among all of TDF, yearns for a long love, an old love, where one’s partner completes and complements them over decades of companionship (“We gon’ keep going ’til our bones both break / It’s the grown folk way”).

+

I did dive into the unreleased leaked tracks by Mac this year, too. It’s a complicated, controversial subject, because it’s unclear whether these songs have been obtained through nefarious means, and friends of Mac’s have said that the leaks have made things difficult for the late rapper’s family. But so many of these songs need to be heard — they show Mac at his most vulnerable in songs like the beautiful, tragic “Pure” (40 plays), where he raps a letter to himself, reflecting on his material success, drug use, and emotional health (“Everybody got opinions when you make millions / All God’s children, let me keep livin’ / I been keepin’ it real / I can’t sleep without pills … I been dealing with some problems, I been longing for your love / Crazy selfish doing drugs / Check off all of the above”).

+

Everything about Mac’s music speaks to a need. A need, for him, to share the world in his head; to find his way out of the darkness. It’s difficult to reconcile the wound of his death; the leaks are a band aid, but there’s something bittersweet in hearing him spit about the addiction that killed him. I find ways to push that reminder out, but many of his songs are steeped in the awareness that his lifestyle would kill him (“Am I okay? / Fuck no / Just so nutso / I need to let the drugs go / I try to find heaven, I get high but never come close”). But we can at least appreciate the beauty he was able to put in the world when he was here. I sometimes feel guilty listening to songs like “Pure” because Mac may have never intended for anyone but him to hear them. It feels wrong to intrude on that, but as “Oracle” (12 plays) concludes, “the people need to hear the music.”

+

Top & Notable Tracks: “God is Fair, Sexy Nasty (feat. Kendrick Lamar)” (65 plays), “Do You Have a Destination?” (54 plays), “In the Air” (47 plays), “Thoughts from a Balcony” (44 plays), “Dunno” (41 plays), “Pure” (40 plays), “Wedding” (39 plays), “Wings” (28 plays)

+
+

Martha (283 plays)

+

It is no secret that I am an avid indie rock fan, and Martha was my sojourn in that world. When Bandcamp Fridays first started up, Martha offered their entire discography plus a bonus album of demos for a discounted price. I jumped on it purely on the knowledge that they had toured with Los Campesinos! a few years back. I was not disappointed. Martha’s music is uncomplicated fun, with the breathlessness and, at times, incoherency of early Cloud Nothings. They shine with absolute bops like “Clatty Harriet” and the bright optimism of “Wrestlemania VIII” (“It’s like a cloud was hanging over me until the day we texted for the first time / And the world just got a little brighter”) and “Six Men Getting Sick Six Times (Mendable)” (“There’s a world outside where I feel so broken / But you make me feel mendable”).

+

There’s an effortlessness and easy appeal to Martha’s music. It’s inoffensive, in a good way — you know exactly what you’ll get with Martha and they deliver on your every want and expectation. Martha is an easy recommendation to make because just about everyone will like Martha. Martha sounds like a fun group of friends got together to make fun indie rock. In 2020, I needed that.

+

Top & Notable Tracks: “1967, I Miss You, I’m Lonely” (17 plays), “Six Men Getting Sick Six Times (Mendable)” (15 plays), “Clatty Harriet” (13 plays), “Heart is Healing” (6 plays)

+
+

Trust Fund (180 plays)

+

Trust Fund again lends itself to my love of indie rock. I’m pretty sure I also discovered them through the Los Campesinos! tour connection — but even before that, I began listening to The Peripheral Ones, a cover band for The Middle Ones that I have previously evangelized. The Peripheral Ones led me to Pigthe, who surprisingly did not chart in my top ten this year, and a month or so later, I started listening to Trust Fund. It wasn’t until a few years later that I learned that the mastermind behind Pigthe is also the guitarist in Trust Fund.

+

Trust Fund therefore offers a similar sound to what I love in The Peripheral Ones: a bedroom rock group with an intimate yet catchy sound. I’m not sure when — if it was in 2020 at all, because time is an illusion — but at some point, I purchased Trust Fund’s entire discography, too, this time based off of my love of “Cut Me Out” from No one’s coming for us. At some point this year, in my unsuccessful attempts to listen to more than just Mac Miller, I put my entire 97GB music library on shuffle to find some underappreciated gems. This turned up a few Trust Fund songs, which I placed on the aptly named “songs in my library that i genuinely have never heard” playlist. This included such gems as “we’re thirteen (and we’re drinking) and “Abundant” among a few others.

+

“songs in my library that i genuinely have never heard”

+

The playlist ended up composed more of a Trust Fund shuffle than full music library, admittedly. While this anecdote maybe speaks more to my goblin-like hoarding of music than my fondness for Trust Fund, these are the kinds of connections and discoveries I live for. I love stumbling upon something new, something saved long ago that ended up becoming relevant again years later. Trust Fund did that, and they were able to stick more than a few songs and hooks in my head this year (“I’m alone in the house / and I’m freaking myself out again / I’m clapping my hands and I’m spinning my arms around”). They’re just catchy.

+

Top & Notable Tracks: “we’ll both apologize” (35 plays), “Dreamers (Stefano Guitar Demo)” (32 plays), “Sadness (demo)” (32 plays), “we’re thirteen and we’re drinking” (32 plays), “Abundant” (28 plays)

+
+

Aether (175 plays)

+

Aether is the moniker of Diego Chavez who, in brief, creates awesome downtempo hip-hop instrumentals. I first stumbled upon his music in 2013, when I scrobbled his album Artifacts (2008) an impressive 542 times. This was around the time that I was on the computer near constantly and liked downtempo hip-hop as my background working and writing music (shouts out to Emancipator and Little People, who also fall into this category). I more or less forgot completely about Aether until this year, when “Caparra,” an old favorite, popped up in a shuffle. I thought to myself, “why not find out what this guy has been up to in the last seven years?”

+

As it turns out, he’s done a bit — Chavez has a Soundcloud where he occasionally posts tracks. But because I’m old now and don’t fully understand Soundcloud, I decided to snag his 2014 release, Solace. I was absolutely blown away by the title track (and first song on the album), and I listened to it on repeat for more than a while this year. The rest of the songs on the album are also great, but they blend together — which isn’t necessarily bad for working music. “Solace,” though, is the standout and deserves to have the album named after it. It’s incredible — the catchy, consistent beat, the abstract melodies, the skittering vocal sample all coalesce into a beautiful breakdown around the two-and-a-half-minute mark. It’s an absolute dream of a track that slowly builds then delivers.

+

Top & Notable Tracks: “Solace” (12 plays), “Untouched” (8 plays), “Tomorrow’s Thief” (8 plays)

+
+

Tokyo Police Club (131 plays)

+

I was listening to Tokyo Police Club demos on my iPod Nano back in 2009 — that’s how far back my relationship with TPC stretches. Another indie darling, I’ve enjoyed the group for some time now, but they dropped off my radar for a few years. This past year, however, one of the many shows I re-binge-watched was Gossip Girl, which features “Bambi” in an episode. It has a delicious and catchy guitar riff that shines through the Chuck Bass melodrama, and I was pleased when I realized the song was by a band I already liked. I went back and downloaded 2010’s Champ after this discovery and kept it on play for a few weeks.

+

Champ is not a big departure from my past affairs with Tokyo Police Club — I was most familiar with Elephant Shell, which released two years prior. Champ features the same clean, catchy sound, but tightened up a bit. It retains the fun, catchy sound from Elephant Shell but matures and adds definition. Funnily enough, the 10th anniversary edition was announced in early December and will release in March of 2021. The list of bonus tracks is impressive — maybe Champ will make my list again next year.

+

Top & Notable Tracks: “Bambi” (17 plays), “Favourite Food” (12 plays), “Breakneck Speed” (8 plays), “Not Sick” (13 plays)

+
+

Jean Dawson (104 plays)

+

Jean Dawson is an artist who made me feel old this year.

+

After seeing Dawson described as “glitch pop,” I knew I had to find his 2020 release, Pixel Bath. Unfortunately, Dawson is in this new artist milieu who seem to release their music only on streaming services and vinyl — so if you’re like me and avoid services like Spotify or Apple Music, you’ll be hard pressed to find a way to actually legitimately pay for a digital download. I forgive Dawson because it seems he is interpedently releasing music under his own label, but there are old people out there (me) who like to have digital copies of their music (me again).

+

Anyway, Pixel Bath is a more recent addition to my library, but I’m loving it. It mixes so many different genres — hip-hop, rap, R&B, powerpop, glitch pop (which is apparently a genre) — in a cascade of sounds and styles. It’s an absolute joy to listen to, with some stand out bangers like “POWER FREAKS” and “Policia.” The former is a favorite of mine, luring you in with a slow, repeated melody until it rushes in with high power, fast rhymes that reflect on the experience of young black men watched by the police. Pixel Bath is filled with unapologetic, boyish, raucous energy, like a paintball match that uses a Gameboy Color soundfont and speaks to Dawson’s experiences as a mixed-Black and Mexican teenager in the US. It’s an important album and a fun album.

+

Top & Notable Tracks: “POWER FREAKS” (20 plays), “Pyrotechnics” (17 plays), “BRUISEBOY” (12 plays), “Policia” (12 plays), “Starface*”(12 plays), “Devilish” (10 plays), “CLEAR BONES” (8 plays), “Triple Double (feat. A$AP ROCKY)” (7 plays)

+
+

Honorable Mentions

+

Those were some of my top, new (to me) artists for the year, but there a few songs I would be remiss not to mention for my 2020 compilation.

+

“celine” by shypig (56 plays)

+

This is one of the songs that I’m not totally sure how I found — I think it was from associated acts with Trust Fund and Pigthe — but I’m so glad I did. Unfortunately, there’s very little information to be found about shypig online — their Bandcamp bio helpfully explains that they are “a shy pig.” “celine” is a dark, mysterious, angsty track that absolutely rips. It haunted me for days, with its cryptic lyrics and obsessive atmosphere. It’s befitting of the RIP everyone album title, at least, and something about shypig’s elusive nature adds to the darkness of “celine.”

+

“Get Away” by The Internet (46 plays)

+

I found The Internet through Mac Miller, as they acted as his backing band for Live from Space — as a group, The Internet have released lots of smooth grooves befitting of a jazz lounge. Those tracks haven’t grabbed me, though I can appreciate them for what they are, but “Get Away,” particularly the version from their Tiny Desk Concert, is absolutely phenomenal. It’s simple and pared back compared to the album release, which allows The Internet to inject some of their typical groove into the dark beat of the original. Both are absolute bops, but the Tiny Desk version has a lightness and humor to it that I relished.

+

“Ring Ring (feat. Clever)” by Juice WRLD (17 plays)

+

Juice WRLD probably would have charted higher on my list if I’d started listening to him earlier in the year — he snuck into my library in mid-December, and I’ve been working my way through his discography since then. “Ring Ring” is a catchy jam that I keep returning to. Like with Mac Miller, Juice WRLD can be difficult to listen to — “Ring Ring” is a bittersweet song when considered in the context of Juice’s death, but I’ve found a way to shake that off and appreciate the music left behind, not the tragic cap on the end of it.

+

“I’ll Believe in Anything” by Wolf Parade (25 plays)

+

This is another song I’ve stumbled upon in a bizarre web of unintended musical connections. I found this song through reddit — some Ask Reddit thread I think where folks were recommending songs — and fell in love with it. But there was something familiar to the vocals — come to find that it was Spencer Krug, who originally recorded and released the song under his Sunset Rubdown moniker, a band I’ve been listening to for years. The Wolf Parade version is inarguably superior, as it’s a fully fleshed out track. “I’ll Believe in Anything” is a song about love — about keeping hope alive, about fighting for and finding happiness. It offered a lightness I scarcely found in 2020, a reminder of the things that keep me strong and the things that bond us all together. It’s a beautiful song.

+
+

We’ve both been very brave

+

Walk around with both legs

+

Fight the scary day

+

We both pull tricks out of our sleeves

+

But I’ll believe in anything

+

And you’ll believe in anything

+

– Wolf Parade, “I’ll Believe in Anything”

+ + + +
+ +
+ +
+ + +
+ + + diff --git a/public/index.xml b/public/index.xml index ba33f5f..c397be7 100644 --- a/public/index.xml +++ b/public/index.xml @@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ http://localhost:1313/week-notes/030/ Mon, 25 Aug 2025 00:00:00 +0000 http://localhost:1313/week-notes/030/ - <h2 id="doing">Doing</h2> <p>I taught my first college class! It went far better than I anticipated; by about half an hour in, I fell into my natural teacher mode and it was smooth sailing from there. I&rsquo;m excited to work with the kids<sup id="fnref:1"><a href="#fn:1" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup> and see how I do throughout the semester. I still have deep-seated imposter syndrome about teaching (<em>adjunct lecturing</em>) the course on a macro-level, but the day-by-day is at least seeming more feasible.</p> <p>For context, the college I&rsquo;m teaching (<em>adjunct lecturing</em><sup id="fnref:2"><a href="#fn:2" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup>) at is my alma mater. I transferred there as a junior from community college, and this course is the first one I took there — with a professor who went on to become a mentor and a personal friend. She scared the shit out of me then (she still does) because she is <em>so good</em> at what she does, so experienced, and (seemingly) effortlessly incredible as a teacher. The idea that I have to, in some way, fill her shoes — teach her class, in the same room I took it, nine years later — is absolutely terrifying. Who am I to tell these kids how to teach?? I have very lovely friends who have talked me up and assured me that I&rsquo;ll do a great job, but I think I&rsquo;ll never be able to shake the feeling that I&rsquo;m not doing what she would have (or not doing as good as her). Of course that&rsquo;s ridiculous and I need to be my own person, and it is within this contradiction that I must exist.</p> <p>I&rsquo;ve been to my classroom a few times this week getting some of the bigger projects done. I&rsquo;ll have time to put on finishing touches on the teacher conference days next week, but I&rsquo;d rather cut open 96 tennis balls at a relaxed pace than rush to do it the day before kids show up.</p> <p>Site-wise, I&rsquo;m continuing to backport content from an old blog. This week I&rsquo;ve added&hellip;</p> <ul> <li><a href="https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015">Here&rsquo;s What I Was Listening to in 2015</a> (01-07-2016)</li> <li><a href="http://cassie.ink/star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together/">Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together</a> (12-14-2015)</li> </ul> <h2 id="reading">Reading</h2> <h2 id="watching">Watching</h2> <h2 id="playing">Playing</h2> <h2 id="listening">Listening</h2> <p>I did a <em>lot</em> of podcast listening this week! Cleaning and organizing my classroom has been a good opportunity for it because it&rsquo;s mostly mindless labor. I&rsquo;ve been digging through Into the Aether&rsquo;s <em>Kingdom Hearts</em> episodes (<a href="https://pca.st/ryz2z5wd">Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep | Bonus</a> and <a href="https://pca.st/m4xgagit">I Norted Myself</a>) plus the <a href="https://pca.st/Kj2p">Song Exploder episode on &ldquo;Miasma Sky.&rdquo;</a></p> <p>I&rsquo;ve been listening to a lot of <em>Pure Particles</em> by The Bug Club. It has some of my favorite songs of theirs (&ldquo;If My Mother Thinks I&rsquo;m Happy,&rdquo; &ldquo;Pure Particles,&rdquo; and &ldquo;A Love Song,&rdquo; primarily). I haven&rsquo;t been quite as enthused with their more recent releases — <em>Very Human Features</em> was good, and I didn&rsquo;t really care about <em>On the Intricate Inner Workings of the System</em><sup id="fnref:3"><a href="#fn:3" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup> — but <em>Pure Particles</em> through <em>Rare Birds</em> is such an incredible run of quality.</p> <p>As part of my mission to upgrade the low quality MP3s I have on my music server, I ordered and ripped a few CDs this week: Johnny Flynn&rsquo;s <em>A Larum</em>, Mirah&rsquo;s <em>C&rsquo;mon Miracle</em>, and Freelance Whales&rsquo;s <em>Weathervanes</em>. I was really only looking for <em>A Larum</em> specifically, but the seller on discogs had a shipping minimum. The others were on my list and the seller happened to have them available. It&rsquo;s a little funny — I was listening to these albums all at a specific point in my life (specifically <em>C&rsquo;mon Miracle</em> and <em>Weathervanes</em> when I was really depressed in my late teens; Johnny Flynn was a bit earlier).</p> <div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes"> <hr> <ol> <li id="fn:1"> <p>I&rsquo;ve found myself referring to the students as &ldquo;kids.&rdquo; They&rsquo;re juniors and seniors in college, so probably at most around ten years younger than me. I&rsquo;m not sure if this is a speech pattern picked up from teaching middle schoolers, who I can safely call kids, or if I&rsquo;m an old lady now. More on that later.&#160;<a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> <li id="fn:2"> <p>This gag entertains me and I will continue it all semester.&#160;<a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> <li id="fn:3"> <p>The exception is &ldquo;Have U Ever Been 2 Wales,&rdquo; which is an all-timer. I wish they had gone more in that direction for their album releases.&#160;<a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> </ol> </div> + <h2 id="doing">Doing</h2> <p>I taught my first college class! It went far better than I anticipated; by about half an hour in, I fell into my natural teacher mode and it was smooth sailing from there. I&rsquo;m excited to work with the kids<sup id="fnref:1"><a href="#fn:1" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">1</a></sup> and see how I do throughout the semester. I still have deep-seated imposter syndrome about teaching (<em>adjunct lecturing</em>) the course on a macro-level, but the day-by-day is at least seeming more feasible.</p> <p>For context, the college I&rsquo;m teaching (<em>adjunct lecturing</em><sup id="fnref:2"><a href="#fn:2" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">2</a></sup>) at is my alma mater. I transferred there as a junior from community college, and this course is the first one I took there — with a professor who went on to become a mentor and a personal friend. She scared the shit out of me then (she still does) because she is <em>so good</em> at what she does, so experienced, and (seemingly) effortlessly incredible as a teacher. The idea that I have to, in some way, fill her shoes — teach her class, in the same room I took it, nine years later — is absolutely terrifying. Who am I to tell these kids how to teach?? I have very lovely friends who have talked me up and assured me that I&rsquo;ll do a great job, but I think I&rsquo;ll never be able to shake the feeling that I&rsquo;m not doing what she would have (or not doing as good as her). Of course that&rsquo;s ridiculous and I need to be my own person, and it is within this contradiction that I must exist.</p> <p>I&rsquo;ve been to my classroom a few times this week getting some of the bigger projects done. I&rsquo;ll have time to put on finishing touches on the teacher conference days next week, but I&rsquo;d rather cut open 96 tennis balls at a relaxed pace than rush to do it the day before kids show up.</p> <p>Site-wise, I&rsquo;m continuing to backport content from an old blog. This week I&rsquo;ve added&hellip;</p> <ul> <li><a href="https://cassie.ink/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/">An Empty Promise to Blog More</a> (06-30-2023)</li> <li><a href="https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/">Here&rsquo;s What I was Listening to in 2020</a> (12-30-2020)</li> <li><a href="https://cassie.ink/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/">Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl</a> (09-28-2016)</li> <li><a href="https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015">Here&rsquo;s What I Was Listening to in 2015</a> (01-07-2016)</li> <li><a href="http://cassie.ink/star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together/">Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together</a> (12-14-2015)</li> </ul> <h2 id="reading">Reading</h2> <h2 id="watching">Watching</h2> <h2 id="playing">Playing</h2> <h2 id="listening">Listening</h2> <p>I did a <em>lot</em> of podcast listening this week! Cleaning and organizing my classroom has been a good opportunity for it because it&rsquo;s mostly mindless labor. I&rsquo;ve been digging through Into the Aether&rsquo;s <em>Kingdom Hearts</em> episodes (<a href="https://pca.st/ryz2z5wd">Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep | Bonus</a> and <a href="https://pca.st/m4xgagit">I Norted Myself</a>) plus the <a href="https://pca.st/Kj2p">Song Exploder episode on &ldquo;Miasma Sky.&rdquo;</a></p> <p>I&rsquo;ve been listening to a lot of <em>Pure Particles</em> by The Bug Club. It has some of my favorite songs of theirs (&ldquo;If My Mother Thinks I&rsquo;m Happy,&rdquo; &ldquo;Pure Particles,&rdquo; and &ldquo;A Love Song,&rdquo; primarily). I haven&rsquo;t been quite as enthused with their more recent releases — <em>Very Human Features</em> was good, and I didn&rsquo;t really care about <em>On the Intricate Inner Workings of the System</em><sup id="fnref:3"><a href="#fn:3" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">3</a></sup> — but <em>Pure Particles</em> through <em>Rare Birds</em> is such an incredible run of quality.</p> <p>As part of my mission to upgrade the low quality MP3s I have on my music server, I ordered and ripped a few CDs this week: Johnny Flynn&rsquo;s <em>A Larum</em>, Mirah&rsquo;s <em>C&rsquo;mon Miracle</em>, and Freelance Whales&rsquo;s <em>Weathervanes</em>. I was really only looking for <em>A Larum</em> specifically, but the seller on discogs had a shipping minimum. The others were on my list and the seller happened to have them available. It&rsquo;s a little funny — I was listening to these albums all at a specific point in my life (specifically <em>C&rsquo;mon Miracle</em> and <em>Weathervanes</em> when I was horrifically depressed in my late teens; Johnny Flynn was a bit earlier).</p> <p>That nostalgia (if you can call it that — is there a nostalgia that&rsquo;s for <em>bad</em> memories?<sup id="fnref:4"><a href="#fn:4" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">4</a></sup>) brought me back to <em>Pullhair Rubeye</em> by Avey Tare &amp; Kría Brekkan, an odd album that was released in reverse. The reversed version (so the normal one) of &ldquo;Lay Lay Off, Faselam&rdquo; is an all-timer for me; I was listening to it a lot in 2012. Releasing the album in reverse was, apparently, a controversial move, but I like it both ways — and I finally took the time to actually reverse it myself.<sup id="fnref:5"><a href="#fn:5" class="footnote-ref" role="doc-noteref">5</a></sup></p> <div class="footnotes" role="doc-endnotes"> <hr> <ol> <li id="fn:1"> <p>I&rsquo;ve found myself referring to the students as &ldquo;kids.&rdquo; They&rsquo;re juniors and seniors in college, so probably at most around ten years younger than me. I&rsquo;m not sure if this is a speech pattern picked up from teaching middle schoolers, who I can safely call kids, or if I&rsquo;m an old lady now. More on that later.&#160;<a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> <li id="fn:2"> <p>This gag entertains me and I will continue it all semester.&#160;<a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> <li id="fn:3"> <p>The exception is &ldquo;Have U Ever Been 2 Wales,&rdquo; which is an all-timer. I wish they had gone more in that direction for their album releases.&#160;<a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> <li id="fn:4"> <p>I believe this is called <em>trauma</em>.&#160;<a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> <li id="fn:5"> <p>I&rsquo;d previously been listening to a shitty 192kbps MP3 someone else did.&#160;<a href="#fnref:5" class="footnote-backref" role="doc-backlink">&#x21a9;&#xfe0e;</a></p> </li> </ol> </div> You wouldn't let it eat you wholе (WN29) @@ -442,6 +442,27 @@ http://localhost:1313/what's-this/ <p>Well, I have another blog.</p> <p>Welcome to <a href="https://cassie.land">cassie.land</a>, the latest (as of writing this) web project that I&rsquo;ve started and may promptly abandon.</p> <p>Here&rsquo;s the truth: These past few months have shown me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).</p> <p>Originally, this was written on my old WordPress blog, a site I&rsquo;ve had up for almost ten years now (and which I will not link, because <em>ten years</em> &ndash; I haven&rsquo;t decided fully what I want to do with it). I&rsquo;ve been using WordPress on and off for random projects for going on fifteen years now, and while it&rsquo;s comfortable and flexible and I know it well, I yearn for something different. Something lighter. Something new. <del>Enter Grav, which I&rsquo;ve now spent the night learning.</del> Enter Hugo, which I switched to kind of on a whim — Grav is cool, but it felt a little too easy. I&rsquo;m a masochist, I guess; I miss code. Grav felt like a shortcut and like more bloat than I wanted.</p> <p>And so I hope to make this a resolution to blog more, openly, about me. I have thoughts I like to share and a desire to catalogue the things I am interested in, and it just doesn’t seem viable any more to do so on any online platforms that I don’t own. I feel, in a sense, “homeless” on the internet, and I think it is time we make those homes on ground that won’t be pulled out from under us by soulless corporations and CEOs.</p> <p>I&rsquo;m not fully sure what this will end up being, but thanks for reading and joining me on the ride.</p> + + An Empty Promise to Blog More + http://localhost:1313/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/ + Fri, 30 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/ + <p>This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).</p> <p>I have channeled these ruminations into redesigning my blog for the eight hundredth time, but this time, I am also resolving to use it more. I have thoughts I like to share and a desire to catalogue the things I am interested in, and it just doesn&rsquo;t seem viable any more to do so on any online platforms that I don&rsquo;t own. I feel, in a sense, &ldquo;homeless&rdquo; on the internet, and I think it is time we make those homes on ground that won&rsquo;t be pulled out from under us with the passing whimsy of a manchild CEO. (In case there is any ambiguity, I am indeed referring to Elon Musk and Steve Huffman.)</p> <p>Will I follow through on that promise? We&rsquo;ll see. In the past, I have been caught up in the idea that this blog should be for long-form posts with deep thinking and planning. Maybe that should still be true, but I also want to embrace the passing whimsy and interests that occupy my time. Thanks for reading and joining me on the ride.</p> + + + Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020 + http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/ + Wed, 30 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/ + <p>It feels like most of my blog posts end up being about music. I’d like to pretend that this post is a piece of an annual tradition in which I review and analyze my listening patterns from the past year, but truth be told, I’ve <a href="https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/">only done this once before, in 2015</a>, and then <a href="https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/">kind of early in 2020, when I reviewed my favorite albums from the last ten years</a>. Truth is, I’d like this to be a tradition, a habit I develop, but I’ve had about as much success with that as I have with my resolution to exercise more regularly.</p> <p>I don’t need to explain that 2020 has been a unique year. If I put on my English major bullshitting hat, I can maybe postulate that I write about music in the years that music was especially important to me. In 2015, music was the backdrop of my first (and current) serious, long-term relationship. I exchanged stolen moments and mix CDs, so the music I was listening to at that time became a sense-memory trigger, a nostalgic sound that brought me back to first kisses and early butterflies. And when I wrote about my favorite albums released from 2010 to 2019, I was making sense of my teenage years — the music that comforted me, changed me, channeled me. It only seems natural then to write about the music in this weird, mixed up year, because quarantine has made a process that’s usually internal for me — listening to and thinking about music — more weighty, more important. I’ve had more time to focus on media like music because there’s not much else to do. I’m spending more time alone in front of my computer than any person normally should. My screen time (which means music time) this past year has probably rivalled the internet addiction of my teen years.</p> <p>I’ve also used these posts to discuss <em>how</em> I listen to music in some way. Sparked by the shutdown of Google Play Music, which was my preferred way to sync my massive music library to my phone, I moved over to Plex and the Plexamp mobile app. It thankfully offers excellent last.fm support, so I continued scrobbling there, but I didn’t set it up until a few weeks into my Plex journey — so a lot of play counts are probably lower than they should be. Still, the numbers paint an accurate picture, even if the exact details are muddy.</p> <p>That all said, let’s get to the wheat and away from the chaff. Here’s the list of music I was listening to in 2020 that wasn’t necessarily released in 2020.</p> <h2 id="mac-miller-1469-plays">Mac Miller (1469 plays)</h2> <blockquote> <p>Movin&rsquo; so fast the clock look slow</p> <p>Water my seeds &rsquo;til the flowers grow</p> <p>Love so much that my heart get broke</p> <p>I don&rsquo;t really know how the normal shit go</p> <p><em>– Mac Miller, &ldquo;Wings&rdquo;</em></p></blockquote> <p>When I <a href="https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/#swimming">wrote about <em>Swimming</em> last year</a>, I was cautious. I knew it was an important album and that it was a gateway for me. I knew there were some phenomenal tracks and impressive flows. A year later, I’m much more effusive in my praise (and critical of the songs I listed as the best — I did not appreciate “Wings” or “Dunno” as they deserve). I’ve moved from my “mac miller songs i think i like but idk” playlist to one titled “i need to listen to something other than mac miller,” partly at my boyfriend’s request, because I truly didn’t listen to much other than Easy Mac with the cheesy raps this year.</p> <p>Part of the appeal of Mac Miller’s music is the variation in his discography and skillset. His abstract jazz EP <em>You</em>, for example, is bookended by the experimental, depressive <em>Macadelic</em>, released eight months prior, and <em>Watching Movies with the Sound Off</em>, which is perhaps his strongest rap album released (rivaled perhaps by <em>GO:OD AM</em>, but that’s a conversation for folks who know way more about rap than me to debate). It’s unfortunate that Mac’s career lasted as little time as it did, cut short by his death in 2018, but he produced an incredible amount in that time — and much of it has yet to see the light of day. There are days I’m looking for early career Mac, the <em>Blue Slide Park</em> and <em>Best Day Ever</em> era, when the world was before him and he was ready (and excited to) conquer it; there are days when the smooth romanticism of <em>Circles</em> and <em>The Divine Feminine</em> are appealing; and there are days when I need the emotional catharsis of his more complicated releases, like <em>Faces</em> or <em>Swimming</em> — two very different releases, but releases that reflected on the complications of fame, depression, and addiction. It is remarkable that one artist who died so young gave the world so much.</p> <p>Unsurprisingly, my top track from this past year was by Mac: “God is Fair, Sexy Nasty (feat. Kendrick Lamar)” (65 plays) from 2016’s <em>The Divine Feminine</em>. I listened to this song on repeat on my drives to work (back when I was driving to work) in late-2019 into 2020. I memorized every line. The song is a beautiful marriage of the soulful elements of love and the physical side — the sexy and the nasty. It’s a tremendously fun song with layered production and samples, and while I skip it most of the time, the outro of Miller’s grandmother reflecting on her late husband is a goofy but earnest addition that, when considered among all of <em>TDF</em>, yearns for a long love, an old love, where one’s partner completes and complements them over decades of companionship (“We gon’ keep going ’til our bones both break / It’s the grown folk way”).</p> <p>I did dive into the unreleased leaked tracks by Mac this year, too. It’s a complicated, controversial subject, because it’s unclear whether these songs have been obtained through nefarious means, and friends of Mac’s have said that the leaks <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/MacMiller/comments/iyfj37/an_end_to_the_music_request_thread_posting_leaks/">have made things difficult for the late rapper’s family</a>. But so many of these songs need to be heard — they show Mac at his most vulnerable in songs like the beautiful, tragic “Pure” (40 plays), where he raps a letter to himself, reflecting on his material success, drug use, and emotional health (“Everybody got opinions when you make millions / All God’s children, let me keep livin’ / I been keepin’ it real / I can’t sleep without pills … I been dealing with some problems, I been longing for your love / Crazy selfish doing drugs / Check off all of the above”).</p> <p>Everything about Mac’s music speaks to a need. A need, for him, to share the world in his head; to find his way out of the darkness. It’s difficult to reconcile the wound of his death; the leaks are a band aid, but there’s something bittersweet in hearing him spit about the addiction that killed him. I find ways to push that reminder out, but many of his songs are steeped in the awareness that his lifestyle would kill him (“Am I okay? / Fuck no / Just so nutso / I need to let the drugs go / I try to find heaven, I get high but never come close”). But we can at least appreciate the beauty he was able to put in the world when he was here. I sometimes feel guilty listening to songs like “Pure” because Mac may have never intended for anyone but him to hear them. It feels wrong to intrude on that, but as “Oracle” (12 plays) concludes, “the people need to hear the music.”</p> <p><strong>Top &amp; Notable Tracks:</strong> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1F6zIO_QMTc">“God is Fair, Sexy Nasty (feat. Kendrick Lamar)”</a> (65 plays), “Do You Have a Destination?” (54 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuBrnShHuR0">“In the Air”</a> (47 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxufWf7dEcM">“Thoughts from a Balcony”</a> (44 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61Lmk2k542k">“Dunno”</a> (41 plays), “Pure” (40 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3elAONl3jY">“Wedding”</a> (39 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_O1qD95xnao">“Wings”</a> (28 plays)</p> <hr> <h2 id="martha-283-plays">Martha (283 plays)</h2> <p>It is no secret that I am an avid indie rock fan, and Martha was my sojourn in that world. When Bandcamp Fridays first started up, Martha offered their entire discography plus a bonus album of demos for a discounted price. I jumped on it purely on the knowledge that they had toured with Los Campesinos! a few years back. I was not disappointed. Martha’s music is uncomplicated fun, with the breathlessness and, at times, incoherency of early Cloud Nothings. They shine with absolute bops like <a href="https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/clatty-harriet">“Clatty Harriet”</a> and the bright optimism of <a href="https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/wrestlemania-viii">“Wrestlemania VIII”</a> (“It’s like a cloud was hanging over me until the day we texted for the first time / And the world just got a little brighter”) and <a href="https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/six-men-getting-sick-six-times-mendable">“Six Men Getting Sick Six Times (Mendable)”</a> (“There’s a world outside where I feel so broken / But you make me feel mendable”).</p> <p>There’s an effortlessness and easy appeal to Martha’s music. It’s inoffensive, in a good way — you know exactly what you’ll get with Martha and they deliver on your every want and expectation. Martha is an easy recommendation to make because just about everyone will like Martha. Martha sounds like a fun group of friends got together to make fun indie rock. In 2020, I needed that.</p> <p><strong>Top &amp; Notable Tracks:</strong> <a href="https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/1967-i-miss-you-im-lonely">“1967, I Miss You, I’m Lonely”</a> (17 plays), <a href="https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/six-men-getting-sick-six-times-mendable">“Six Men Getting Sick Six Times (Mendable)”</a> (15 plays), <a href="https://marthadiy.bandcamp.com/track/clatty-harriet">“Clatty Harriet”</a> (13 plays), <a href="https://bsmrocks.bandcamp.com/track/heart-is-healing">“Heart is Healing”</a> (6 plays)</p> <hr> <h2 id="trust-fund-180-plays">Trust Fund (180 plays)</h2> <p>Trust Fund again lends itself to my love of indie rock. I’m pretty sure I also discovered them through the Los Campesinos! tour connection — but even before that, I began listening to The Peripheral Ones, a cover band for The Middle Ones that <a href="https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/#chants">I have previously evangelized</a>. The Peripheral Ones led me to Pigthe, who surprisingly did not chart in my top ten this year, and a month or so later, I started listening to Trust Fund. It wasn’t until a few years later that I learned that the mastermind behind Pigthe is also the guitarist in Trust Fund.</p> <p>Trust Fund therefore offers a similar sound to what I love in The Peripheral Ones: a bedroom rock group with an intimate yet catchy sound. I’m not sure when — if it was in 2020 at all, because time is an illusion — but at some point, I purchased Trust Fund’s entire discography, too, this time based off of my love of <a href="https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/cut-me-out">“Cut Me Out”</a> from <em>No one’s coming for us</em>. At some point this year, in my unsuccessful attempts to listen to more than just Mac Miller, I put my entire 97GB music library on shuffle to find some underappreciated gems. This turned up a few Trust Fund songs, which I placed on the aptly named “songs in my library that i genuinely have never heard” playlist. This included such gems as “we’re thirteen (and we’re drinking) and “Abundant” among a few others.</p> <p><img src="https://cdn.cassie.ink/images/2020/playlist.png" alt="&ldquo;songs in my library that i genuinely have never heard&rdquo;"></p> <p>The playlist ended up composed more of a Trust Fund shuffle than full music library, admittedly. While this anecdote maybe speaks more to my goblin-like hoarding of music than my fondness for Trust Fund, these are the kinds of connections and discoveries I live for. I love stumbling upon something new, something saved long ago that ended up becoming relevant again years later. Trust Fund did that, and they were able to stick more than a few songs and hooks in my head this year (“I’m alone in the house / and I’m freaking myself out again / I’m clapping my hands and I’m spinning my arms around”). They’re just <em>catchy</em>.</p> <p><strong>Top &amp; Notable Tracks:</strong> <a href="https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/well-both-apologise">“we’ll both apologize”</a> (35 plays), <a href="https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/dreamers-stefano-guitar-demo">“Dreamers (Stefano Guitar Demo)”</a> (32 plays), <a href="https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/sadness-demo">“Sadness (demo)”</a> (32 plays), <a href="https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/were-thirteen-and-were-drinking">“we’re thirteen and we’re drinking”</a> (32 plays), <a href="https://trustfund.bandcamp.com/track/abundant">“Abundant”</a> (28 plays)</p> <hr> <h2 id="aether-175-plays">Aether (175 plays)</h2> <p>Aether is the moniker of Diego Chavez who, in brief, creates awesome downtempo hip-hop instrumentals. I first stumbled upon his music in 2013, when I scrobbled his album <em>Artifacts</em> (2008) an impressive 542 times. This was around the time that I was on the computer near constantly and liked downtempo hip-hop as my background working and writing music (shouts out to Emancipator and Little People, who also fall into this category). I more or less forgot completely about Aether until this year, when <a href="https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/caparra">“Caparra,”</a> an old favorite, popped up in a shuffle. I thought to myself, “why not find out what this guy has been up to in the last seven years?”</p> <p>As it turns out, he’s done a bit — Chavez has a <a href="https://soundcloud.com/aether">Soundcloud</a> where he occasionally posts tracks. But because I’m old now and don’t fully understand Soundcloud, I decided to snag his 2014 release, <em>Solace</em>. I was absolutely blown away by the title track (and first song on the album), and I listened to it on repeat for more than a while this year. The rest of the songs on the album are also great, but they blend together — which isn’t necessarily bad for working music. “Solace,” though, is the standout and deserves to have the album named after it. It’s incredible — the catchy, consistent beat, the abstract melodies, the skittering vocal sample all coalesce into a beautiful breakdown around the two-and-a-half-minute mark. It’s an absolute dream of a track that slowly builds then delivers.</p> <p><strong>Top &amp; Notable Tracks:</strong> <a href="https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/solace">“Solace”</a> (12 plays), <a href="https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/untouched">“Untouched”</a> (8 plays), <a href="https://aether.bandcamp.com/track/tomorrows-thief">“Tomorrow’s Thief”</a> (8 plays)</p> <hr> <h2 id="tokyo-police-club-131-plays">Tokyo Police Club (131 plays)</h2> <p>I was listening to Tokyo Police Club demos on my iPod Nano back in 2009 — that’s how far back my relationship with TPC stretches. Another indie darling, I’ve enjoyed the group for some time now, but they dropped off my radar for a few years. This past year, however, one of the many shows I re-binge-watched was <em>Gossip Girl</em>, which features “Bambi” in an episode. It has a delicious and catchy guitar riff that shines through the Chuck Bass melodrama, and I was pleased when I realized the song was by a band I already liked. I went back and downloaded 2010’s <em>Champ</em> after this discovery and kept it on play for a few weeks.</p> <p><em>Champ</em> is not a big departure from my past affairs with Tokyo Police Club — I was most familiar with <em>Elephant Shell</em>, which released two years prior. <em>Champ</em> features the same clean, catchy sound, but tightened up a bit. It retains the fun, catchy sound from <em>Elephant Shell</em> but matures and adds definition. Funnily enough, <a href="https://www.pastemagazine.com/music/tokyo-police-club/tokyo-police-club-announce-champ-anniversary/">the 10th anniversary edition was announced in early December</a> and will release in March of 2021. The list of bonus tracks is impressive — maybe <em>Champ</em> will make my list again next year.</p> <p><strong>Top &amp; Notable Tracks:</strong> <a href="https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/bambi">“Bambi”</a> (17 plays), <a href="https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/favourite-food">“Favourite Food”</a> (12 plays), <a href="https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/breakneck-speed">“Breakneck Speed”</a> (8 plays), <a href="https://tokyo-police-club.bandcamp.com/track/not-sick">“Not Sick”</a> (13 plays)</p> <hr> <h2 id="jean-dawson-104-plays">Jean Dawson (104 plays)</h2> <p>Jean Dawson is an artist who made me feel <em>old</em> this year.</p> <p>After seeing Dawson described as “glitch pop,” I knew I had to find his 2020 release, <em>Pixel Bath</em>. Unfortunately, Dawson is in this new artist milieu who seem to release their music only on streaming services and vinyl — so if you’re like me and avoid services like Spotify or Apple Music, you’ll be hard pressed to find a way to actually legitimately pay for a digital download. I forgive Dawson because it seems he is interpedently releasing music under his own label, but there are old people out there (me) who like to have digital copies of their music (me again).</p> <p>Anyway, Pixel Bath is a more recent addition to my library, but I’m loving it. It mixes so many different genres — hip-hop, rap, R&amp;B, powerpop, glitch pop (which is apparently a genre) — in a cascade of sounds and styles. It’s an absolute joy to listen to, with some stand out bangers like “POWER FREAKS” and “Policia.” The former is a favorite of mine, luring you in with a slow, repeated melody until it rushes in with high power, fast rhymes that reflect on the experience of young black men watched by the police. <em>Pixel Bath</em> is filled with unapologetic, boyish, raucous energy, like a paintball match that uses a Gameboy Color soundfont and speaks to Dawson’s experiences as a mixed-Black and Mexican teenager in the US. It’s an important album and a fun album.</p> <p><strong>Top &amp; Notable Tracks:</strong> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CB5BzBNKYY">“POWER FREAKS”</a> (20 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUWKZLxopCg">“Pyrotechnics”</a> (17 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elSZfsrjOxQ">“BRUISEBOY”</a> (12 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrLRpQCt1yI">“Policia”</a> (12 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3hYjI3UnEY">“Starface*”</a>(12 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoGhwUxSmTc">“Devilish”</a> (10 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYUiCP3eMAA">“CLEAR BONES”</a> (8 plays), <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmPdsM6gyGw">“Triple Double (feat. A$AP ROCKY)”</a> (7 plays)</p> <hr> <h2 id="honorable-mentions">Honorable Mentions</h2> <p>Those were some of my top, new (to me) artists for the year, but there a few songs I would be remiss not to mention for my 2020 compilation.</p> <p><strong><a href="https://shypig.bandcamp.com/track/celine">&ldquo;celine&rdquo; by shypig</a> (56 plays)</strong></p> <p>This is one of the songs that I’m not totally sure <em>how</em> I found — I think it was from associated acts with Trust Fund and Pigthe — but I’m so glad I did. Unfortunately, there’s very little information to be found about shypig online — their Bandcamp bio helpfully explains that they are “a shy pig.” “celine” is a dark, mysterious, angsty track that absolutely rips. It haunted me for days, with its cryptic lyrics and obsessive atmosphere. It’s befitting of the <em>RIP everyone</em> album title, at least, and something about shypig’s elusive nature adds to the darkness of “celine.”</p> <p><strong>&ldquo;Get Away&rdquo; by The Internet (46 plays)</strong></p> <p>I found The Internet through Mac Miller, as they acted as his backing band for <em>Live from Space</em> — as a group, The Internet have released lots of smooth grooves befitting of a jazz lounge. Those tracks haven’t grabbed me, though I can appreciate them for what they are, but “Get Away,” particularly the version <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6j49uzPugA">from their Tiny Desk Concert</a>, is absolutely phenomenal. It’s simple and pared back compared to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z32HJ7PHnKY">the album release</a>, which allows The Internet to inject some of their typical groove into the dark beat of the original. Both are absolute bops, but the Tiny Desk version has a lightness and humor to it that I relished.</p> <p><strong>&ldquo;Ring Ring (feat. Clever)&rdquo; by Juice WRLD (17 plays)</strong></p> <p>Juice WRLD probably would have charted higher on my list if I’d started listening to him earlier in the year — he snuck into my library in mid-December, and I’ve been working my way through his discography since then. “Ring Ring” is a catchy jam that I keep returning to. Like with Mac Miller, Juice WRLD can be difficult to listen to — “Ring Ring” is a bittersweet song when considered in the context of Juice’s death, but I’ve found a way to shake that off and appreciate the music left behind, not the tragic cap on the end of it.</p> <p><strong>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll Believe in Anything&rdquo; by Wolf Parade (25 plays)</strong></p> <p>This is another song I’ve stumbled upon in a bizarre web of unintended musical connections. I found this song through reddit — some Ask Reddit thread I think where folks were recommending songs — and fell in love with it. But there was something familiar to the vocals — come to find that it was Spencer Krug, who originally recorded and released the song under his Sunset Rubdown moniker, a band I’ve been listening to for years. The Wolf Parade version is inarguably superior, as it’s a fully fleshed out track. “I’ll Believe in Anything” is a song about love — about keeping hope alive, about fighting for and finding happiness. It offered a lightness I scarcely found in 2020, a reminder of the things that keep me strong and the things that bond us all together. It’s a beautiful song.</p> <blockquote> <p>We&rsquo;ve both been very brave</p> <p>Walk around with both legs</p> <p>Fight the scary day</p> <p>We both pull tricks out of our sleeves</p> <p>But I&rsquo;ll believe in anything</p> <p>And you&rsquo;ll believe in anything</p> <p><em>– Wolf Parade, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll Believe in Anything&rdquo;</em></p></blockquote> + + + Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + <p>Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: <em>Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl</em>, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women.</p> <h2 id="congratulations-pirates-you-did-the-absolute-least-you-possibly-could">Congratulations, Pirates: You Did the Absolute Least You Possibly Could</h2> <p>A handful of women in appear in <em>The Curse of the Black Pearl</em>, only one of whom boasts a significant role in the film. Keira Knightley plays Elizabeth Swann, the female lead and romantic interest of early-noughties dreamboat Orlando Bloom, best known for his turn as Legolas in <em>The Lord of the Rings</em>, possessor of elf-eyes and occasional gay lover to the hotter, more rugged Aragorn (disclaimer: I have not read much Tolkien). A pre-blue alien CGI and green alien body paint Zoë Saldana pops up as Anamaria roughly a third of the way into the film, a member of Jack Sparrow’s (Johnny Depp) ragtag crew. Her name is mentioned approximately once. The remaining named women are Estrella, Elizabeth’s maid, who appears in a brief scene (no more than a few minutes), along with Scarlett and Giselle, who are implied to have had sex with Johnny Depp’s character.</p> <p>While the latter three women exist, albeit as extremely minor characters, their presence can hardly be considered exceptional, as they are either servants or sex objects. That said, with a count of four named women compared to at least twice that of men, the film nonetheless coasts by the first criteria of the Bechdel-Wallace test: to include at least two named female characters.</p> <p>The sole scene involving two women conversing with one another is the aforementioned scene with Estrella, when she chats with Elizabeth. <em>The Curse of the Black Pearl</em> thus passes the second criteria of the Bechdel-Wallace test (to have two women speak to each other), but the subject of their conversation leads to the film’s ultimate failure.</p> <p>Estrella and Elizabeth chat about the latter’s impending engagement to Commodore Norrington, a man. The two women gab about it being a “lucky match,” given the Commodore’s high-ranking within society, but Elizabeth balks, in part because her fiancé-to-be tragically resembles Nicholas Cage, and also because she is in secret love with Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), a common blacksmith. The film therefore implies some sort of female friendship, as Estrella and Elizabeth are in close enough confidence for Estrella to know Elizabeth’s heart. However, Elizabeth dismisses Estrella for speaking out of turn (code for speaking to her while being a Filthy Poor), the power dynamic ceasing any sort of meaningful conversation about hierarchies of power, gender, and class, reducing their conversation to the mere romantic gossip of the day.</p> <blockquote> <p>So we’re all men of our word really… Except for, of course, Elizabeth, who is, in fact, a woman, and therefore has nothing interesting or valuable to say.</p> <p>– Captain Jack Sparrow</p></blockquote> <p>The limited nature of this conversation is unfortunate considering how easily it could have been elevated. Elizabeth’s rejection of traditional norms and values within the film isn’t limited to just her romantic choices (though that’s certainly the focus of her plotline) but also her fascination with the forbidden world of pirates. Elizabeth chiding Estrella for forgetting her place seems particularly out of character in this context too, as the audience is meant to understand Elizabeth as not only resistant to the structures of power but also as compassionate to the lower-class. Her shutting down the conversation may have been a mere attempt by her to avoid admitting her feelings for Will, but plays out more like the movie not wanting to waste time with the conversations of women and fleshing out Elizabeth’s character. This potential sits just below the film’s waters, but the filmmakers fail to surface it.</p> <p>This repudiation of society by Elizabeth remains present in the film, but mostly exists within the context of her romance with Will. She jaunts around with Jack Sparrow and outsmarts several pirates, but she is also subject to their sexual harassment, stemming not only from her captors (oh yeah — Elizabeth acts as the damsel in distress for much of the film) but also from Jack. Regarding the latter, his harassment of Elizabeth is played not to be disturbing but for the audience’s humor and enjoyment, like when Sparrow asks if Elizabeth might be hiding something in her bodice, gazes at her chest, and remarks that it’s unlikely given the size.</p> <p>The film thus attempts to endear the audience to Sparrow by way of objectifying and mocking Elizabeth. It seems a particularly ill-conceived joke as well considering that part of Keira Knightley’s daily makeup session for the film was a whooping 45 minutes dedicated to making her breasts look larger and to give her what she calls “<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-517780/The-secret-flat-chested-Keira-buxom-pirate-girl.html">the cleavage effect</a>.” She described the experience positively in that same interview with the Daily Mail in February of 2008:</p> <blockquote> <p>They painted my tits on me for the films, which is extraordinary because it’s kind of a dying art form – in the past, they used to have whole sections of the studios devoted to bosom make-up… And I loved it, completely loved it. Because it was the first time in my life I had big tits, and I didn’t even need surgery.</p></blockquote> <p>While women are free to choose to have breast augmentation surgeries or employ other methods of making their chests look fuller, we must question from where the desire stems. Tabloids and media have scrutinized Knightley’s body all through her career, criticizing her thin frame. Filmmakers and advertisers have deemed her body as something needing to be changed, like when her breasts were digitally edited in promotional material for her 2004 film King Arthur. By July of 2008, just a few months after the interview about <em>Pirates</em>, Knightley <a href="http://www.afterellen.com/general-news/35471-dont-touch-keira-knightleys-breasts">took a stand</a>: while she perhaps hadn’t cared in the past, she did now. She refused any makeup or Photoshop tricks to “enhance” her chest for her 2008 film, <em>The Duchess</em>, citing her pride and comfort in her body. A gorgeous, slender woman like Knightley — with fame to boot — of course has a degree of privilege in the complicated world of body image, as she more or less represents the ideal constantly presented to women. However, her stance against altering her natural appearance for the male gaze remains notable, especially when analyzing the first <em>Pirates</em> film: while Elizabeth might quip about corsets, the film’s rebellion against contemporary beauty standards and progressive attitude towards women remains completely superficial. The film continues to perpetuate the very standards it pretends to diverge against.</p> <p>To return to the treatment of Elizabeth’s character by other characters in the film, in another scene, Elizabeth infamously burns a cache of alcohol to create a signal fire when she and Jack have been marooned on an island. Lamenting his now forced sobriety, Jack quips, “there’ll be no living with her after this,” his personal twist on the delightful aphorism “women, can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em.” The truth in his jest is that a determined woman like Elizabeth (Jack is content to waste away on the island) cannot be borne unless one is intoxicated.</p> <p>In the final battle of the movie, Elizabeth appears in a solider’s coat and pants; her dress was soaked and she had to change for decency and to avoid pneumonia (despite that the many men in the film are constantly drenched — the implication here being that women are more delicate). It’s a refreshing change from the corsets and large dresses she spends the rest of the film in (though she returns to them by the film’s end), but the shots with Knightley in the costume are short and easy to miss in all the action. She barely participates in the fight and almost never without the assistance of a man, usually Will. The conception of her character may point to a progressive portrayal of a woman, but utterly fails in execution; the filmmakers want to have their cake and eat it too. They mock corsets but seemingly agree with their purpose.</p> <p><img src="https://cdn.cassie.ink/images/2016/pirates.jpg" alt="Elizabeth in pants"></p> <p>Anamaria too represents wasted potential in <em>Pirates of the</em> <em>Caribbean</em>, an opportunity to elevate the film’s inclusion of women beyond servants and sex objects. A fully realized character for Anamaria would have been especially notable as it would feature a woman of color in a non-sexualized, non-servile role. In her first scene, Anamaria admonishes Jack for his owing her a ship, implying a swashbuckling or sailing history on her part. But after she is established as part of Jack’s ragtag crew, she appears only in the background and speaks only to confirm her orders from Jack Sparrow or the first-mate, Gibbs. A woman’s presence on a ship in the era of course would have been notable, and Anamaria could have been an interesting counterpart for Elizabeth — inspiration to ultimately commit to a life as a pirate — as well as an interesting character in her own right. Once again, however, the movies see fit to not spend their time on such a plotline, let alone on allowing these two women to interact.</p> <h2 id="i-have-exactly-one-emotion-ever-and-it-is-disappointed">I Have Exactly One Emotion, Ever, and It Is &ldquo;Disappointed&rdquo;</h2> <p><em>Pirates of the</em> <em>Caribbean</em> at least makes some effort to include women and bandies interesting directions and back stories for them but fails to translate them into anything substantial. It certainly had opportunity to, with many critics agreeing that scenes in the film ran long and could have been edited down significantly, as well as much of the plot’s back-and-forth reduced. That time could instead have been dedicated to developing these interesting characters, rather than the repetitive antics of inconsequential pirates. Yes, it’s a movie about pirates; they’re literally in the title. But why can’t women be those pirates? Why can’t they be a major part of the action, without having to be helped, rescued, or protected? Why can’t they exist without being madonnas, whores, servants, or scorned women?`</p> <p>I lack clear recollections of the franchise’s later films, though most agree that their quality deteriorates after the second film. From what I do remember, they fail to add many more female characters to the mix, though Elizabeth remains in at least the next two, and she is presumably given more to do than be rescued by Will (hopefully). <em>The Curse of the Black Pearl</em> passes only the first two criterion of the Bechdel-Wallace test, but the test itself represents an ankle-high bar that, sadly, most films continue to trip over, <em>Pirates of the Caribbean</em> included.</p> <hr> <p><em>I originally wrote this for an assignment in a Diversity &amp; Education course; I have modified the tone and expanded the content for this blog.</em></p> + Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2015 http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/ diff --git a/public/posts/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html b/public/posts/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a4ad67c --- /dev/null +++ b/public/posts/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,114 @@ + + + + + + + + + +An Empty Promise to Blog More | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + +
+

+ + cassie + + ink + +

+ + + + +
+
+ +
+ + + +

An Empty Promise to Blog More

+ +
+ +
+ + + +

This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).

+

I have channeled these ruminations into redesigning my blog for the eight hundredth time, but this time, I am also resolving to use it more. I have thoughts I like to share and a desire to catalogue the things I am interested in, and it just doesn’t seem viable any more to do so on any online platforms that I don’t own. I feel, in a sense, “homeless” on the internet, and I think it is time we make those homes on ground that won’t be pulled out from under us with the passing whimsy of a manchild CEO. (In case there is any ambiguity, I am indeed referring to Elon Musk and Steve Huffman.)

+

Will I follow through on that promise? We’ll see. In the past, I have been caught up in the idea that this blog should be for long-form posts with deep thinking and planning. Maybe that should still be true, but I also want to embrace the passing whimsy and interests that occupy my time. Thanks for reading and joining me on the ride.

+ + + + +
+ + +
+ + + diff --git a/public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis/index.html b/public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4df4257 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/posts/heres-what-i-was-lis/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,110 @@ + + + + + + + + + + | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + +
+

+ + cassie + + ink + +

+ + + + +
+
+ +
+ + + +

+ +
+ +
+ + + + + + + +
+ + +
+ + + diff --git a/public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html b/public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4df4257 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/posts/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,110 @@ + + + + + + + + + + | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + +
+

+ + cassie + + ink + +

+ + + + +
+
+ +
+ + + +

+ +
+ +
+ + + + + + + +
+ + +
+ + + diff --git a/public/posts/index.html b/public/posts/index.html index 88702b1..a65d9e5 100644 --- a/public/posts/index.html +++ b/public/posts/index.html @@ -438,6 +438,34 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + @@ -469,7 +497,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/index.xml b/public/posts/index.xml index 22d3c26..989a263 100644 --- a/public/posts/index.xml +++ b/public/posts/index.xml @@ -225,6 +225,27 @@ http://localhost:1313/what's-this/ <p>Well, I have another blog.</p> <p>Welcome to <a href="https://cassie.land">cassie.land</a>, the latest (as of writing this) web project that I&rsquo;ve started and may promptly abandon.</p> <p>Here&rsquo;s the truth: These past few months have shown me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).</p>     + + An Empty Promise to Blog More + http://localhost:1313/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/ + Fri, 30 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/ + <p>This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).</p> + + + Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020 + http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/ + Wed, 30 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020/ + <p>It feels like most of my blog posts end up being about music. I’d like to pretend that this post is a piece of an annual tradition in which I review and analyze my listening patterns from the past year, but truth be told, I’ve <a href="https://cassie.ink/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/">only done this once before, in 2015</a>, and then <a href="https://cassie.ink/my-top-ten-albums-from-the-2010s/">kind of early in 2020, when I reviewed my favorite albums from the last ten years</a>. Truth is, I’d like this to be a tradition, a habit I develop, but I’ve had about as much success with that as I have with my resolution to exercise more regularly.</p> + + + Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + <p>Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: <em>Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl</em>, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women.</p> + Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2015 http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/ diff --git a/public/posts/page/2/index.html b/public/posts/page/2/index.html index b649030..709d154 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/2/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/2/index.html @@ -455,6 +455,34 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + @@ -486,7 +514,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/page/3/index.html b/public/posts/page/3/index.html index 19506d0..496a991 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/3/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/3/index.html @@ -477,6 +477,34 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + @@ -508,7 +536,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/page/4/index.html b/public/posts/page/4/index.html index e71edb8..d5b55f6 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/4/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/4/index.html @@ -442,6 +442,30 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + @@ -473,7 +497,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/page/5/index.html b/public/posts/page/5/index.html index 6b9c14c..ea3b857 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/5/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/5/index.html @@ -448,6 +448,30 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + @@ -468,7 +492,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/page/6/index.html b/public/posts/page/6/index.html index a14a76a..9bc0f0a 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/6/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/6/index.html @@ -250,12 +250,9 @@ - - - @@ -277,12 +274,9 @@ - - - @@ -304,12 +298,9 @@ - - - @@ -331,14 +322,11 @@ - - - @@ -366,14 +354,11 @@ - - - @@ -401,14 +386,11 @@ - - - @@ -436,14 +418,11 @@ - - - @@ -471,14 +450,11 @@ - - - @@ -495,6 +471,30 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + @@ -508,7 +508,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/page/7/index.html b/public/posts/page/7/index.html index f2328af..2f3eb71 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/7/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/7/index.html @@ -75,6 +75,81 @@ +
    + +

    An Empty Promise to Blog More

    +
    + an-empty-promise-to-blog-more +
    +

    This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).

    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +

    Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2020

    +
    + heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2020 +
    +

    It feels like most of my blog posts end up being about music. I’d like to pretend that this post is a piece of an annual tradition in which I review and analyze my listening patterns from the past year, but truth be told, I’ve only done this once before, in 2015, and then kind of early in 2020, when I reviewed my favorite albums from the last ten years. Truth is, I’d like this to be a tradition, a habit I develop, but I’ve had about as much success with that as I have with my resolution to exercise more regularly.

    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +

    Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl

    +
    + women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl +
    +

    Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women.

    + +
    + +
    + +
    +
    -
    - -

    Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together

    -
    - star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together -
    -

    Let’s start by making something perfectly clear: I love Star Wars. I live and breathe Star Wars. They’re some of my favorite movies, games, and comics; I’ve read more than my fair share of Star Wars fanfiction and have, over the years, spent a ludicrous amount of money on merchandise and other paraphernalia.

    -

    When someone, tasked with buying me a gift, asks for ideas, I give them one instruction: if it has Star Wars on it, I’ll like it.

    - -
    - -
    - -
    - -
    - -

    Revolutions

    -
    - revolutions -
    -

    The harrowing process of puberty hit me in 2005, around the midpoint between my 10th and 11th birthday. I blame whatever weird hormones we feed kids these days, and that I probably continue to consume today, for its early onset, or perhaps I can deflect the blame to my parents and chalk it up to genetics — but whichever way, suddenly I found hair creeping up where it had never been before, dried blood on bargain brand, butterfly-clad underwear. Under oversized tee shirts, burgeoning breasts lumped together, hardly noticeable, but they would surely be big one day, I told myself with equal parts dread and wonder — after all, I had already donned my first bra, one of the first in my class, but certainly not the first to worry whether these new marks of my sex would throw my jump shot, bar me from swimming pools for twelve weeks out of the year, and shepherd me into the “girl’s section” of clothing stores where I’d exchange cargo shorts and sneakers for dresses and romances. I’d worry about entering middle school, about finding my locker and my classrooms, about making friends and who my future self would be, whether she’d look anything like the girl I saw reflected in the mirror.

    - -
    - -
    - -
    - -
    - -

    Life is Strange Episode 1: Chrysalis

    -
    - life-is-strange-episode-1-chrysalis -
    -

    Set in the fictional town of Arcadia Bay, Life is Strange follows Max, the recently minted 18-year-old photography nerd, attending the elite Blackwall Academy. In the trend of episodic games, Life is Strange centers around player choice, the butterfly effect being both a literal and figurative force in the game. It manages, however, to distinguish itself from not only Telltale Games — with its unique center and focus on two teenage girls, as well as its gorgeous, indie-film presentation — but also from just about everything else we’re seeing in gaming today.

    - -
    - -
    - -
    - @@ -316,8 +311,6 @@ - - @@ -330,12 +323,6 @@ -
  • - - 4 - -
    • - @@ -478,6 +465,41 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
  • + + 9 + +
    • + + + @@ -491,7 +513,7 @@
  • - + Last
    • diff --git a/public/posts/page/8/index.html b/public/posts/page/8/index.html index bc327d6..76334bb 100644 --- a/public/posts/page/8/index.html +++ b/public/posts/page/8/index.html @@ -52,6 +52,86 @@ +
    + +

    Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together

    +
    + star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together +
    +

    Let’s start by making something perfectly clear: I love Star Wars. I live and breathe Star Wars. They’re some of my favorite movies, games, and comics; I’ve read more than my fair share of Star Wars fanfiction and have, over the years, spent a ludicrous amount of money on merchandise and other paraphernalia.

    +

    When someone, tasked with buying me a gift, asks for ideas, I give them one instruction: if it has Star Wars on it, I’ll like it.

    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +

    Revolutions

    +
    + revolutions +
    +

    The harrowing process of puberty hit me in 2005, around the midpoint between my 10th and 11th birthday. I blame whatever weird hormones we feed kids these days, and that I probably continue to consume today, for its early onset, or perhaps I can deflect the blame to my parents and chalk it up to genetics — but whichever way, suddenly I found hair creeping up where it had never been before, dried blood on bargain brand, butterfly-clad underwear. Under oversized tee shirts, burgeoning breasts lumped together, hardly noticeable, but they would surely be big one day, I told myself with equal parts dread and wonder — after all, I had already donned my first bra, one of the first in my class, but certainly not the first to worry whether these new marks of my sex would throw my jump shot, bar me from swimming pools for twelve weeks out of the year, and shepherd me into the “girl’s section” of clothing stores where I’d exchange cargo shorts and sneakers for dresses and romances. I’d worry about entering middle school, about finding my locker and my classrooms, about making friends and who my future self would be, whether she’d look anything like the girl I saw reflected in the mirror.

    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +
    + +

    Life is Strange Episode 1: Chrysalis

    +
    + life-is-strange-episode-1-chrysalis +
    +

    Set in the fictional town of Arcadia Bay, Life is Strange follows Max, the recently minted 18-year-old photography nerd, attending the elite Blackwall Academy. In the trend of episodic games, Life is Strange centers around player choice, the butterfly effect being both a literal and figurative force in the game. It manages, however, to distinguish itself from not only Telltale Games — with its unique center and focus on two teenage girls, as well as its gorgeous, indie-film presentation — but also from just about everything else we’re seeing in gaming today.

    + +
    + +
    + +
    +
    -
    - -

    Princess Bubblegum & Marceline: Still Just Almost Girlfriends

    -
    - princess-bubblegum-marceline-still-just-almost-girlfriends -
    -

    It’s only natural that the first post on my shiny new blog should be about these two, isn’t it?

    -

    Let me preface this post by saying that I love Princess Bubblegum and Marceline and Bubbline and Sugarless Gum, all of that — whatever you’d like to call it, I ship it. Hard. I may not be a long-time Adventure Time fan; I have not experienced firsthand the “What Was Missing” controversy, the joy delivered when Sky Witch premiered, and so on. I jumped on-board late, binge-watched my way to this pairing, which washed over me with all its fluffy, tumultuous grace. I was vaguely aware that it was a popular ship as I made my way up to “What Was Missing”; I transcended as I witnessed Marceline’s impromptu, angst-ridden love ballad to Peebles; I immediately rewatched “Go With Me”, eager to see the pair’s first on-screen interaction; I stormed ahead to “Sky Witch”. I filled my tumblr with all the lovely fanart in existence for the couple, bemusing my followers who already taunted me for my FemShep/Liara obsession; I formed headcanons, all of it.

    - -
    - -
    - -
    - @@ -264,8 +318,6 @@ - - @@ -278,12 +330,6 @@ -
  • - - 4 - -
    • - @@ -426,12 +472,59 @@ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
  • + + 9 + +
    • + + + +
  • + + + +
    • + +
  • + + Last + +
    • + diff --git a/public/posts/page/9/index.html b/public/posts/page/9/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b00f4f5 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/posts/page/9/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,458 @@ + + + + + + + + + +Posts | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +

    + + cassie + + ink + +

    + + + + +
    +
    + +

    All Posts

    + + + +
    + +

    Princess Bubblegum & Marceline: Still Just Almost Girlfriends

    +
    + princess-bubblegum-marceline-still-just-almost-girlfriends +
    +

    It’s only natural that the first post on my shiny new blog should be about these two, isn’t it?

    +

    Let me preface this post by saying that I love Princess Bubblegum and Marceline and Bubbline and Sugarless Gum, all of that — whatever you’d like to call it, I ship it. Hard. I may not be a long-time Adventure Time fan; I have not experienced firsthand the “What Was Missing” controversy, the joy delivered when Sky Witch premiered, and so on. I jumped on-board late, binge-watched my way to this pairing, which washed over me with all its fluffy, tumultuous grace. I was vaguely aware that it was a popular ship as I made my way up to “What Was Missing”; I transcended as I witnessed Marceline’s impromptu, angst-ridden love ballad to Peebles; I immediately rewatched “Go With Me”, eager to see the pair’s first on-screen interaction; I stormed ahead to “Sky Witch”. I filled my tumblr with all the lovely fanart in existence for the couple, bemusing my followers who already taunted me for my FemShep/Liara obsession; I formed headcanons, all of it.

    + +
    + +
    + +
    + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
      + + + +
    • + + First + +
      • + + + + +
    • + + + +
      • + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    • + + 5 + +
      • + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    • + + 6 + +
      • + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    • + + 7 + +
      • + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    • + + 8 + +
      • + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    • + + 9 + +
      • + + + + + + + + + + +
    + + + +
    + + + diff --git a/public/sitemap.xml b/public/sitemap.xml index cc5afaa..7d3ca31 100644 --- a/public/sitemap.xml +++ b/public/sitemap.xml @@ -257,14 +257,17 @@ http://localhost:1313/what's-this/ 2023-07-26T00:00:00+00:00 - http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/ - 2016-01-07T00:00:00+00:00 + http://localhost:1313/tags/movies/ + 2016-09-28T00:00:00+00:00 + + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + 2016-09-28T00:00:00+00:00 http://localhost:1313/tags/wordpress/ - 2016-01-07T00:00:00+00:00 + 2016-09-28T00:00:00+00:00 - http://localhost:1313/tags/movies/ - 2015-12-14T00:00:00+00:00 + http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/ + 2016-01-07T00:00:00+00:00 http://localhost:1313/star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together/ 2015-12-14T00:00:00+00:00 diff --git a/public/tags/ai/index.html b/public/tags/ai/index.html index d9abe9a..1439c28 100644 --- a/public/tags/ai/index.html +++ b/public/tags/ai/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/audio/index.html b/public/tags/audio/index.html index e93656b..4aadfea 100644 --- a/public/tags/audio/index.html +++ b/public/tags/audio/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/exercise/index.html b/public/tags/exercise/index.html index 0459e3f..87aca96 100644 --- a/public/tags/exercise/index.html +++ b/public/tags/exercise/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/games/index.html b/public/tags/games/index.html index 403f43c..325388b 100644 --- a/public/tags/games/index.html +++ b/public/tags/games/index.html @@ -57,17 +57,17 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/home/index.html b/public/tags/home/index.html index b702582..8a79908 100644 --- a/public/tags/home/index.html +++ b/public/tags/home/index.html @@ -57,17 +57,17 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/index.html b/public/tags/index.html index 48583b2..a9994cc 100644 --- a/public/tags/index.html +++ b/public/tags/index.html @@ -89,10 +89,10 @@

    Undergrad

    -

    Wordpress

    -

    Movies

    +

    Wordpress

    +

    Star-Wars

    Television

    diff --git a/public/tags/index.xml b/public/tags/index.xml index bf11ccc..968766b 100644 --- a/public/tags/index.xml +++ b/public/tags/index.xml @@ -142,17 +142,17 @@     - Wordpress - http://localhost:1313/tags/wordpress/ - Thu, 07 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000 - http://localhost:1313/tags/wordpress/ + Movies + http://localhost:1313/tags/movies/ + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/tags/movies/ - Movies - http://localhost:1313/tags/movies/ - Mon, 14 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000 - http://localhost:1313/tags/movies/ + Wordpress + http://localhost:1313/tags/wordpress/ + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/tags/wordpress/ diff --git a/public/tags/internet/index.html b/public/tags/internet/index.html index 8a81534..e664dba 100644 --- a/public/tags/internet/index.html +++ b/public/tags/internet/index.html @@ -57,24 +57,24 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/life/index.html b/public/tags/life/index.html index 366d7e3..7d49206 100644 --- a/public/tags/life/index.html +++ b/public/tags/life/index.html @@ -57,80 +57,80 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/literature/index.html b/public/tags/literature/index.html index 79f6672..43f4ef2 100644 --- a/public/tags/literature/index.html +++ b/public/tags/literature/index.html @@ -57,38 +57,38 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/media-log/index.html b/public/tags/media-log/index.html index 0026612..af8def2 100644 --- a/public/tags/media-log/index.html +++ b/public/tags/media-log/index.html @@ -57,24 +57,24 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/meta/index.html b/public/tags/meta/index.html index 19e77fe..95d597b 100644 --- a/public/tags/meta/index.html +++ b/public/tags/meta/index.html @@ -57,38 +57,38 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/metsa/index.html b/public/tags/metsa/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a38418a --- /dev/null +++ b/public/tags/metsa/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,109 @@ + + + + + + + + + +Metsa | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +

    + + cassie + + ink + +

    + + + + +
    +
    + +

    All posts tagged with + + + Metsa + +

    + + + + + +
    + + + diff --git a/public/tags/metsa/index.xml b/public/tags/metsa/index.xml new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c1dfa48 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/tags/metsa/index.xml @@ -0,0 +1,19 @@ + + + + Metsa on cassie.ink + http://localhost:1313/tags/metsa/ + Recent content in Metsa on cassie.ink + Hugo + en-us + Fri, 30 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000 + + + An Empty Promise to Blog More + http://localhost:1313/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/ + Fri, 30 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/an-empty-promise-to-blog-more/ + <p>This past year has emphasized to me the impermanence of online platforms. I have quit reddit with the third-party API shutdowns, and while I am probably better off for it, it does feel like losing one of the bastions of the internet I once knew. I regret to inform that I am officially an old person on the internet; I yearn for the days of hyper-specific Geocities pages with incredibly useful information written by a thirteen year old screaming into the void (and for the days where our search engines actually directed us to that information rather than some circuitous tripe written by AI that packs in every SEO keyword without actually saying anything).</p> + + + diff --git a/public/tags/movies/index.html b/public/tags/movies/index.html index 05c3be9..97decbe 100644 --- a/public/tags/movies/index.html +++ b/public/tags/movies/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,17 @@ + + diff --git a/public/tags/movies/index.xml b/public/tags/movies/index.xml index 662ae46..ad1aeea 100644 --- a/public/tags/movies/index.xml +++ b/public/tags/movies/index.xml @@ -6,8 +6,15 @@ Recent content in Movies on cassie.ink Hugo en-us - Mon, 14 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000 + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + + Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + <p>Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: <em>Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl</em>, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women.</p> + Star Wars Has a Problem with Women and We’re Going to Fix It Together http://localhost:1313/star-wars-has-a-problem-with-women-and-were-going-to-fix-it-together/ diff --git a/public/tags/music/index.html b/public/tags/music/index.html index 26c0735..31b5747 100644 --- a/public/tags/music/index.html +++ b/public/tags/music/index.html @@ -57,45 +57,45 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/podcasting/index.html b/public/tags/podcasting/index.html index aff0ce1..eb661cc 100644 --- a/public/tags/podcasting/index.html +++ b/public/tags/podcasting/index.html @@ -57,17 +57,17 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/pokemon/index.html b/public/tags/pokemon/index.html index 54e2238..7b9cde0 100644 --- a/public/tags/pokemon/index.html +++ b/public/tags/pokemon/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/politics/index.html b/public/tags/politics/index.html index b2eccd2..26a89df 100644 --- a/public/tags/politics/index.html +++ b/public/tags/politics/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/prompts/index.html b/public/tags/prompts/index.html index 5ff547f..9cae579 100644 --- a/public/tags/prompts/index.html +++ b/public/tags/prompts/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/star-wars/index.html b/public/tags/star-wars/index.html index 6192967..98b51f1 100644 --- a/public/tags/star-wars/index.html +++ b/public/tags/star-wars/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/teaching/index.html b/public/tags/teaching/index.html index f3ee407..7ad6e11 100644 --- a/public/tags/teaching/index.html +++ b/public/tags/teaching/index.html @@ -57,31 +57,31 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/television/index.html b/public/tags/television/index.html index 8fefce4..2ae708b 100644 --- a/public/tags/television/index.html +++ b/public/tags/television/index.html @@ -57,10 +57,10 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/undergrad/index.html b/public/tags/undergrad/index.html index ccd48c0..c93c499 100644 --- a/public/tags/undergrad/index.html +++ b/public/tags/undergrad/index.html @@ -57,17 +57,17 @@ diff --git a/public/tags/wordpress/index.html b/public/tags/wordpress/index.html index 53573e5..18801d8 100644 --- a/public/tags/wordpress/index.html +++ b/public/tags/wordpress/index.html @@ -57,52 +57,59 @@ + + diff --git a/public/tags/wordpress/index.xml b/public/tags/wordpress/index.xml index ba18a77..3a46000 100644 --- a/public/tags/wordpress/index.xml +++ b/public/tags/wordpress/index.xml @@ -6,8 +6,15 @@ Recent content in Wordpress on cassie.ink Hugo en-us - Thu, 07 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + + Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + Wed, 28 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000 + http://localhost:1313/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/ + <p>Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: <em>Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl</em>, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women.</p> + Here’s What I Was Listening to in 2015 http://localhost:1313/heres-what-i-was-listening-to-in-2015/ diff --git a/public/week-notes/030/index.html b/public/week-notes/030/index.html index 80b20b2..29874d7 100644 --- a/public/week-notes/030/index.html +++ b/public/week-notes/030/index.html @@ -65,6 +65,9 @@

    I’ve been to my classroom a few times this week getting some of the bigger projects done. I’ll have time to put on finishing touches on the teacher conference days next week, but I’d rather cut open 96 tennis balls at a relaxed pace than rush to do it the day before kids show up.

    Site-wise, I’m continuing to backport content from an old blog. This week I’ve added…

    @@ -74,7 +77,8 @@

    Listening

    I did a lot of podcast listening this week! Cleaning and organizing my classroom has been a good opportunity for it because it’s mostly mindless labor. I’ve been digging through Into the Aether’s Kingdom Hearts episodes (Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep | Bonus and I Norted Myself) plus the Song Exploder episode on “Miasma Sky.”

    I’ve been listening to a lot of Pure Particles by The Bug Club. It has some of my favorite songs of theirs (“If My Mother Thinks I’m Happy,” “Pure Particles,” and “A Love Song,” primarily). I haven’t been quite as enthused with their more recent releases — Very Human Features was good, and I didn’t really care about On the Intricate Inner Workings of the System3 — but Pure Particles through Rare Birds is such an incredible run of quality.

    -

    As part of my mission to upgrade the low quality MP3s I have on my music server, I ordered and ripped a few CDs this week: Johnny Flynn’s A Larum, Mirah’s C’mon Miracle, and Freelance Whales’s Weathervanes. I was really only looking for A Larum specifically, but the seller on discogs had a shipping minimum. The others were on my list and the seller happened to have them available. It’s a little funny — I was listening to these albums all at a specific point in my life (specifically C’mon Miracle and Weathervanes when I was really depressed in my late teens; Johnny Flynn was a bit earlier).

    +

    As part of my mission to upgrade the low quality MP3s I have on my music server, I ordered and ripped a few CDs this week: Johnny Flynn’s A Larum, Mirah’s C’mon Miracle, and Freelance Whales’s Weathervanes. I was really only looking for A Larum specifically, but the seller on discogs had a shipping minimum. The others were on my list and the seller happened to have them available. It’s a little funny — I was listening to these albums all at a specific point in my life (specifically C’mon Miracle and Weathervanes when I was horrifically depressed in my late teens; Johnny Flynn was a bit earlier).

    +

    That nostalgia (if you can call it that — is there a nostalgia that’s for bad memories?4) brought me back to Pullhair Rubeye by Avey Tare & Kría Brekkan, an odd album that was released in reverse. The reversed version (so the normal one) of “Lay Lay Off, Faselam” is an all-timer for me; I was listening to it a lot in 2012. Releasing the album in reverse was, apparently, a controversial move, but I like it both ways — and I finally took the time to actually reverse it myself.5

      @@ -87,6 +91,12 @@

    1. The exception is “Have U Ever Been 2 Wales,” which is an all-timer. I wish they had gone more in that direction for their album releases. ↩︎

      2. +
    2. +

      I believe this is called trauma. ↩︎

      +
      3. +
    3. +

      I’d previously been listening to a shitty 192kbps MP3 someone else did. ↩︎

      +
    diff --git a/public/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/index.html b/public/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/index.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d8f9783 --- /dev/null +++ b/public/women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl/index.html @@ -0,0 +1,149 @@ + + + + + + + + + +Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl | cassie.ink + + + + + + + + + + + +
    +

    + + cassie + + ink + +

    + + + + +
    +
    + +
    + + + +

    Women in a Sea of Men: The Representation of Women in The Curse of the Black Pearl

    + +
    + women-in-a-sea-of-men-the-representation-of-women-in-the-curse-of-the-black-pearl +
    + + +
    + + +

    Recently, my boyfriend and I decided to revisit a childhood classic: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, the film that jump-started what would prove to be an extremely lucrative and much beloved franchise for Disney. I first watched it not long after its 2003 release, making me 8 or 9 at the time, and enjoyed it, like most other children at the time. It brims with swashbuckling adventure and humor while maintaining Disney’s family-friendly directive. Unfortunately, with my older, more world-weary eyes saw through the dust of nostalgia, dismayed as the film makes no effort to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test, which stands as an absolute bare minimum requirement for a creative endeavor’s portrayal of women.

    +

    Congratulations, Pirates: You Did the Absolute Least You Possibly Could

    +

    A handful of women in appear in The Curse of the Black Pearl, only one of whom boasts a significant role in the film. Keira Knightley plays Elizabeth Swann, the female lead and romantic interest of early-noughties dreamboat Orlando Bloom, best known for his turn as Legolas in The Lord of the Rings, possessor of elf-eyes and occasional gay lover to the hotter, more rugged Aragorn (disclaimer: I have not read much Tolkien). A pre-blue alien CGI and green alien body paint Zoë Saldana pops up as Anamaria roughly a third of the way into the film, a member of Jack Sparrow’s (Johnny Depp) ragtag crew. Her name is mentioned approximately once. The remaining named women are Estrella, Elizabeth’s maid, who appears in a brief scene (no more than a few minutes), along with Scarlett and Giselle, who are implied to have had sex with Johnny Depp’s character.

    +

    While the latter three women exist, albeit as extremely minor characters, their presence can hardly be considered exceptional, as they are either servants or sex objects. That said, with a count of four named women compared to at least twice that of men, the film nonetheless coasts by the first criteria of the Bechdel-Wallace test: to include at least two named female characters.

    +

    The sole scene involving two women conversing with one another is the aforementioned scene with Estrella, when she chats with Elizabeth. The Curse of the Black Pearl thus passes the second criteria of the Bechdel-Wallace test (to have two women speak to each other), but the subject of their conversation leads to the film’s ultimate failure.

    +

    Estrella and Elizabeth chat about the latter’s impending engagement to Commodore Norrington, a man. The two women gab about it being a “lucky match,” given the Commodore’s high-ranking within society, but Elizabeth balks, in part because her fiancé-to-be tragically resembles Nicholas Cage, and also because she is in secret love with Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), a common blacksmith. The film therefore implies some sort of female friendship, as Estrella and Elizabeth are in close enough confidence for Estrella to know Elizabeth’s heart. However, Elizabeth dismisses Estrella for speaking out of turn (code for speaking to her while being a Filthy Poor), the power dynamic ceasing any sort of meaningful conversation about hierarchies of power, gender, and class, reducing their conversation to the mere romantic gossip of the day.

    +
    +

    So we’re all men of our word really… Except for, of course, Elizabeth, who is, in fact, a woman, and therefore has nothing interesting or valuable to say.

    +

    – Captain Jack Sparrow

    +

    The limited nature of this conversation is unfortunate considering how easily it could have been elevated. Elizabeth’s rejection of traditional norms and values within the film isn’t limited to just her romantic choices (though that’s certainly the focus of her plotline) but also her fascination with the forbidden world of pirates. Elizabeth chiding Estrella for forgetting her place seems particularly out of character in this context too, as the audience is meant to understand Elizabeth as not only resistant to the structures of power but also as compassionate to the lower-class. Her shutting down the conversation may have been a mere attempt by her to avoid admitting her feelings for Will, but plays out more like the movie not wanting to waste time with the conversations of women and fleshing out Elizabeth’s character. This potential sits just below the film’s waters, but the filmmakers fail to surface it.

    +

    This repudiation of society by Elizabeth remains present in the film, but mostly exists within the context of her romance with Will. She jaunts around with Jack Sparrow and outsmarts several pirates, but she is also subject to their sexual harassment, stemming not only from her captors (oh yeah — Elizabeth acts as the damsel in distress for much of the film) but also from Jack. Regarding the latter, his harassment of Elizabeth is played not to be disturbing but for the audience’s humor and enjoyment, like when Sparrow asks if Elizabeth might be hiding something in her bodice, gazes at her chest, and remarks that it’s unlikely given the size.

    +

    The film thus attempts to endear the audience to Sparrow by way of objectifying and mocking Elizabeth. It seems a particularly ill-conceived joke as well considering that part of Keira Knightley’s daily makeup session for the film was a whooping 45 minutes dedicated to making her breasts look larger and to give her what she calls “the cleavage effect.” She described the experience positively in that same interview with the Daily Mail in February of 2008:

    +
    +

    They painted my tits on me for the films, which is extraordinary because it’s kind of a dying art form – in the past, they used to have whole sections of the studios devoted to bosom make-up… And I loved it, completely loved it. Because it was the first time in my life I had big tits, and I didn’t even need surgery.

    +

    While women are free to choose to have breast augmentation surgeries or employ other methods of making their chests look fuller, we must question from where the desire stems. Tabloids and media have scrutinized Knightley’s body all through her career, criticizing her thin frame. Filmmakers and advertisers have deemed her body as something needing to be changed, like when her breasts were digitally edited in promotional material for her 2004 film King Arthur. By July of 2008, just a few months after the interview about Pirates, Knightley took a stand: while she perhaps hadn’t cared in the past, she did now. She refused any makeup or Photoshop tricks to “enhance” her chest for her 2008 film, The Duchess, citing her pride and comfort in her body. A gorgeous, slender woman like Knightley — with fame to boot — of course has a degree of privilege in the complicated world of body image, as she more or less represents the ideal constantly presented to women. However, her stance against altering her natural appearance for the male gaze remains notable, especially when analyzing the first Pirates film: while Elizabeth might quip about corsets, the film’s rebellion against contemporary beauty standards and progressive attitude towards women remains completely superficial. The film continues to perpetuate the very standards it pretends to diverge against.

    +

    To return to the treatment of Elizabeth’s character by other characters in the film, in another scene, Elizabeth infamously burns a cache of alcohol to create a signal fire when she and Jack have been marooned on an island. Lamenting his now forced sobriety, Jack quips, “there’ll be no living with her after this,” his personal twist on the delightful aphorism “women, can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em.” The truth in his jest is that a determined woman like Elizabeth (Jack is content to waste away on the island) cannot be borne unless one is intoxicated.

    +

    In the final battle of the movie, Elizabeth appears in a solider’s coat and pants; her dress was soaked and she had to change for decency and to avoid pneumonia (despite that the many men in the film are constantly drenched — the implication here being that women are more delicate). It’s a refreshing change from the corsets and large dresses she spends the rest of the film in (though she returns to them by the film’s end), but the shots with Knightley in the costume are short and easy to miss in all the action. She barely participates in the fight and almost never without the assistance of a man, usually Will. The conception of her character may point to a progressive portrayal of a woman, but utterly fails in execution; the filmmakers want to have their cake and eat it too. They mock corsets but seemingly agree with their purpose.

    +

    Elizabeth in pants

    +

    Anamaria too represents wasted potential in Pirates of the Caribbean, an opportunity to elevate the film’s inclusion of women beyond servants and sex objects. A fully realized character for Anamaria would have been especially notable as it would feature a woman of color in a non-sexualized, non-servile role. In her first scene, Anamaria admonishes Jack for his owing her a ship, implying a swashbuckling or sailing history on her part. But after she is established as part of Jack’s ragtag crew, she appears only in the background and speaks only to confirm her orders from Jack Sparrow or the first-mate, Gibbs. A woman’s presence on a ship in the era of course would have been notable, and Anamaria could have been an interesting counterpart for Elizabeth — inspiration to ultimately commit to a life as a pirate — as well as an interesting character in her own right. Once again, however, the movies see fit to not spend their time on such a plotline, let alone on allowing these two women to interact.

    +

    I Have Exactly One Emotion, Ever, and It Is “Disappointed”

    +

    Pirates of the Caribbean at least makes some effort to include women and bandies interesting directions and back stories for them but fails to translate them into anything substantial. It certainly had opportunity to, with many critics agreeing that scenes in the film ran long and could have been edited down significantly, as well as much of the plot’s back-and-forth reduced. That time could instead have been dedicated to developing these interesting characters, rather than the repetitive antics of inconsequential pirates. Yes, it’s a movie about pirates; they’re literally in the title. But why can’t women be those pirates? Why can’t they be a major part of the action, without having to be helped, rescued, or protected? Why can’t they exist without being madonnas, whores, servants, or scorned women?`

    +

    I lack clear recollections of the franchise’s later films, though most agree that their quality deteriorates after the second film. From what I do remember, they fail to add many more female characters to the mix, though Elizabeth remains in at least the next two, and she is presumably given more to do than be rescued by Will (hopefully). The Curse of the Black Pearl passes only the first two criterion of the Bechdel-Wallace test, but the test itself represents an ankle-high bar that, sadly, most films continue to trip over, Pirates of the Caribbean included.

    +
    +

    I originally wrote this for an assignment in a Diversity & Education course; I have modified the tone and expanded the content for this blog.

    + + + +
    + +
    + +
    + + +
    + + +