Linkage

[stillsostrange]

One of these is about the place I live. One is about the place I want to live. You figure out which is which.

From cpolk, From the PM's address on The Civil Marriage Act

From bloodwedding, Molly Ivins, Texas, taxes, kids getting screwed.

ETA:
And from The Zero , an excerpt from Judith Moore's Fat Girl and Moore's reasons for telling the truth.

Some days I'm just too tired to be angry.

Comments

[bloodwedding.livejournal.com]

Fat girl looks excellent (in a very depressing way) doesn't it? I read the excerpt and the essay and almost stumbled over myself to get the book. Of course, I stumbled back into my house b/c it's not out until March 7. =( I was really impressed by the aggressive honesty about why she wrote the book in the voice that she did. Even if I don't like the rest of the book it'll be worth buying it.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

I'll probably read Fat Girl, because the genre is still small enough that I read most everything I hear of that comes out about being fat (except diet books) sooner or later. Plus the sheer power of it. That woman can write.

But her "why I wrote this" essay bugs me, because much as the excerpt rings with gut-grabbing detail? It's not the truth about being fat. It's only her truth about being fat. She's not the only writer who's telling a truth about what it's like to be fat. Camryn Manheim did, and so did Mo'nique, and so did Susan Stinson, and I'm sure other people did too.

No book I ever wrote about being fat would sound anything like what Moore's talking about, because while some of it is familar, in some pretty important ways that never was my life. And in even more ways it isn't now, when I'm fatter than ever.

It bugs me to hear somebody say "they don't tell you the truth" as if the rest of us must be hiding in shame or denial instead of just having truths of our own.

(This may be an over-reaction to her choice of words. I've got a really sensitive early detection system for people who think theirs is the only experience that's real, legacy of growing up with a narcissist father. And I'm reluctant to read an entire book by someone who feels that way.)

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

Yeah--I would prefer her to say "my truth" instead of "the truth". But I still respect that she's talking about it, especially if it doesn't have a happy ending.

[shawn-scarber.livejournal.com]

Our rights must be eternal, not subject to political whim. Yeah, that would be nice to hear from our leaders, wouldn't it?

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

I used to live in Texas. It would be a much better place if there were more than one Molly Ivins. Or if there were more people with her views outside Austin (or inside Austin, in the State Lege).