scorcha - the art of sarah richardson

29th Apr 2013 | 998 notes

sarahreesbrennan:

If you follow me on twitter, you know I watch Game of Thrones. Admittedly, my roommate and I watch it pretty casually: we call it Game of Boobs and every time there’s a scene with boobs we take a tea break. (We like to have a lot of tea breaks. And boy, we get a lot of tea breaks.)

I’ve read the books (BECAUSE I HAVE READ ALL BOOKS) though my roomie hasn’t. So I went in hoping Brienne would be amazing, and hoping as I still hope that she and Jaime would GET MARRIED and be TOGETHER 5EVA.

My engagement with Game of Thrones has really been stepped up this season, because I remembered how much I liked this, and the actors are killing it.

It was always going to be my kryptonite, because I love sass and also BRAVE LADIES!!! (I don’t know why, as I’m a total coward myself.)

I also love me some TROPE SUBVERSION. I have never met a trope I didn’t want to subvert.

So seeing the brave warrior clasp the swooning damsel, and having the brave warrior be a lady and the swooning damsel a dude, is something I very much enjoy. Hence my reblogging of these pictures.

And of course, it’s more complicated than that: the swooning damsel is a guy we’re introduced to as a VERY BAD MAN (which is true), and someone who has a lot of manly power—son of a powerful dude, awesome at fighting—and who becomes a stronger character for having many traditional markers of strength taken away from him.

So, the two things I love. 1) Trope subversions and 2) Complications.

Yeah, Sarah kept talking about this amazing lady that was coming and I was looking forward to her, but I had no idea she was going to break my heart with love every moment that she was on screen. This scene just about killed me.

(Source: maidmargaery)

29th Apr 2013 | 5,484 notes

If owning a gun and knowing how to use it worked, the military would be the safest place for a woman. It’s not.

If women covering up their bodies worked, Afghanistan would have a lower rate of sexual assault than Polynesia. It doesn’t.

If not drinking alcohol worked, children would not be raped. They are.

If your advice to a woman to avoid rape is to be the most modestly dressed, soberest and first to go home, you may as well add “so the rapist will choose someone else”.

If your response to hearing a woman has been raped is “she didn’t have to go to that bar/nightclub/party” you are saying that you want bars, nightclubs and parties to have no women in them. Unless you want the women to show up, but wear kaftans and drink orange juice. Good luck selling either of those options to your friends.

Or you could just be honest and say that you don’t want less rape, you want (even) less prosecution of rapists.

When people scoff at the message that we need to teach people not to rape they make the assumption that the lesson goes: “Rape is bad. Don’t do it.” That is not what the lesson looks like. The lesson, once it is adopted, will be that every single person out there, regardless of any defining personal characteristics, is a human being of value, and with a right to make their own decisions about what bodily contact to have with others. There is nothing a person can do that makes them less deserving of that right. Violating any person’s right to control the when, what and who with of their sexual interactions is wrong. Do it and you will be punished, and you will deserve it.

N.B. While not all those who are raped are women, and not all rapists are men, much less rape apologists; rape prevention myths are always targeted at women, and this post reflects this. My language in the final paragraph is very consciously gender-neutral.

—A Short Post on Rape Prevention (via stfuconservatives)

28th Apr 2013 | 1,285 notes

(Source: zaksmith)

26th Apr 2013 | 14,841 notes

gingerhaze:

An assignment for Advanced Digital! We were supposed to make a gif portrait of a historical figure. I chose Julie d’Aubigny, 17th century swordsmaster and opera singer, responsible for the deaths of at least ten men in duels, and openly bisexual. After her lover was placed into a convent by the girl’s parents, d’Aubigny took the vows to enter the convent as a novice, then rescued her lover and set the convent on fire to cover their escape. Dang.

(via unwinona)