immigration

People of color are often seen as the exceptions in predominantly white societies' mass media, like US literature. Let's look at race and gender in two dystopic young adult scenarios in which the exceptional group is not people of color, but clones they've created.

"If you see something, say something" has been the slogan for buses, trains, and airports since 9/11. It's been used to justify increased surveillance and targeting of Muslims and people from the Middle East. After the Boston bombing, we've seen it used to mislabel the suspected Boston bomber as a "dark-skinned male" and later to misidentify Sunil Tripathi by Reddit users.

Kat Zhang's What's Left of Me takes the mass suspicion, xenophobia, and hysteria that's become normalized since 9/11 and sets it in an alternate United States where people are born with two personalities inside one body.

Are you a criminal? Let me be specific: have you committed the civil offense of working in the United States without papers? Have you thwarted our nation of laws through heinous acts of unauthorized fruit picking? How about using your degree from UC Berkeley to perform renegade statistical analysis? Are you one of the 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States?

Good morning! Here's all the feminist news on our radar today. 

• Did England's Queen come out in support of gay rights? Well, not specifically. [Guardian] 

• Senators drafting immigration reform bill finally agree on one thing: The bill needs to offer legal status to the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants currently in the country. [LA Times] 

• Alaska Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski added a special exclusion to the Violence Against Women Act that bars 229 Alaskan tribes from getting help under the act. Since when do senators want fewer benenfits for their constituents? [Anchorage Daily News] 

• Ruth Bader Ginsburg! The New Yorker has a long profile of the Supreme Court "heavyweight" who has been a legal force for equality. [New Yorker] 

• With traditional social structures around dating and marriage in China dissolving, the process of finding a spouse has become a bizarre commercial transaction that puts The Bachelor to shame. [New York Times]

• Yesterday was national Thank an Abortion Provider Day! I bet they'd still appreciate some thanks a day late. [Feministing]

• Writer Zerlina Maxwell managed to use a guest spot on FOX News to critique rape culture. [Colorlines] 

• What's next for Susan Rice? Maybe a spot as Obama's national security adviser. [Guardian]

• New film Spring Breakers is garnering a lot of attention for two of its female leads: former "squeaky clean" Disney stars who are flipping to the other side of the sexual continuum. [New York Times]    

What did I miss? Add it to the comments!

Good morning! Here's a list of feminist news from around the internet to kick off your week. 

• Leaked emails show that immigration officials have set deportation quotas to hit. [Colorlines] 

• Last week the Pope quit, this week it becomes clear that staying in the Vatican shields him from prosecution in sexual abuse cases. [Towleroad] 

• Same-sex couples involving an immigrant partner are in terrible spot. With no chance for getting a green card through marriage, some couples have to leave the country to stay together. [New York Times] 

• Constant phone calls, meshing of identity, guilting and shaming: Recognizing the signs of abusive dating in teens. [Motherlode] 

• Famed South African sprinter Oscar Pistorius is suspected of having been involved in killing a woman. [Guardian]  

• Mapping math: Girls outperformed boys around the world on a math and science test, but not in the US. [Sociological Images]

• For marketers, the default is male: A survey of toys and other products with branded "normal" and "girl" versions. [Sociological Images] 

• Daryl Hannah is using her fame to send Obama a message: Reject the Keystone XL Pipeline. [Guardian] 

• Meanwhile, what's the history of the Harlem Shake? [Racialicious] 

• Beth Ditto has a new video with the Gossip, "Get to Work"! [Queerty] 

• And in closing: This guy is awesome. [Retronaut] 

Onscreen, young women of color with immigrant parents are often far from traditional. Consider All-American Girl's Margaret Kim (Margaret Cho), Grey's Anatomy's Callie Torres (Sara Ramirez), The Office's Kelly Kapoor (Mindy Kaling), and Elementary's Joan Watson (Lucy Liu). Though these characters' parents are from various socioeconomic backgrounds and countries of origin, these young women all strive to balance their parents' expectations with their own expectations against the backdrop of society's often sexist and racist assumptions. And though these are some of my favorite characters on television, their experiences often veer from those of real-life second-generation immigrant women.

On the New Girl episode "Table 34," Cece (Hannah Simone) attends an Indian marriage convention hoping to meet an Indian guy for a long-term relationship. She had been with lovable douchebag Schmidt (Max Greenfield) but wants to date someone whom her Indian-born parents will approve of. When her friends hear about the convention, they decide that they want to check it out, too—though only Schmidt dresses like, in Winston's words, "the fortune teller in Big." At the convention, she has to fill out an application including her resume. The event hostess seats her at Table 34, which is clearly the losers' table. Has there been some mistake? The event organizer says, "Over 30 [years old], no advanced degrees, part-time employment. Table 34." Cece replies that she's a professional model, "I was in Lil Wayne's last video. I was the girl he was throwing strawberries at in slow motion?" The woman says, "Definitely Table 34."

Fashion model Cece is downwardly mobile compared to her parents, but she hopes that landing an Indian man will help her gain their approval.

Good morning! Happy Monday! Here's our list of feminist news links to kick off your week. 

• Grammy Time: Was Frank Ocean stiffed awards because he's unconventional? [Guardian] Will we all let out a collective sign of relief at some future date when Rihanna dumps that jerk Chris Brown? [Jezebel] 

• Millions of immigrants could be cut out of immgration reform. Here's the infograph to prove it. [Colorlines] 

• FOX News accidentally endorses same-sex marriage: The news agency mistakenly runs a photo of a lesbian couple to illustrate a story about the need for traditional gender roles in marriage. [Feministing] 

• Standing up to domestic violence... on Social Media: An American woman living in China posted photos online of the bruises she received from her husband, building support as she fought for justice through an apathetic and discouraging court system. [NYTimes]

• Hooray for contraception! The US teen pregnancy rate is at an all-time low. [Jezebel]

• Science says: Gender doesn't determine whether you're "assertive" or other traits traditionally thought of as male. [Buzzfeed]

• Who are these "female readers"? A great little historical retrospective on peoples' conceptions of what women want to read. [LA Review of Books] 

• Sylvia! Today is the 50th anniversary of great writer Sylvia Plath's death. [Guardian] 

• One more reason to never listen to Rush: On gun control, he disrespects and distorts the histories of African-Americans. [Miami Herland] 

• Who made Mardi Gras for tourists? A history of the race and class behind Mardi Gras Krewes. [Sociological Images] 

• Finally! A statistical analysis of what rappers actually say about the police [Sociological Images] 

Did I miss anything? Post it in the comments!

What a week! Here's some of what caught our attention in the blogosphere:

• At Racialicious, Bitch contributor Latoya Peterson speaks of how Planned Parenthood has helped her personally. On Saturday, people across the United States rallied in the Walk for Choice to save PP's funding; see some of their signs here.
• After a hate crime including arson, couple Carol Ann and Laura Stutte have gotten the runaround from their insurance. Join change.org in telling American National Property and Casualty to pay on the claim.
• Comments in Brittany Shoot's posts have shown our readers' interest in the topic of adoption. What did you think of Adam Pertman's opinion piece in the Huffington Post?
• Also at HuffPo, David Sirota points to a number of '80s films that he claims influence modern thinking about race and government. Care to weigh in?
• Good news from Feministing: no more so-called conscience clause!
• The long-running, QUILTBAG-friendly Lyon-Martin Health Services in San Francisco needs support; see how you can help.
• Immigration Impact debunks the myth of undocumented workers raising unemployment and lowering wages. (via AlterNet)
• Katz at Original Plumbing discusses depictions of trans* people on television.
• Jamilah King at Colorlines talks about the importance of black workers to the fight for public employee unions.
• Excited for South by Southwest (SXSW?) Us too! Don't miss Bitch contributor and Deeply Problematic creator RMJ and Tiger Beatdown's Garland Grey in Dealing with Internet Drama in Feminist Discourse.
• Meanwhile, Tiger Beatdown's creator, Sady Doyle, has thoughts at The Atlantic about that Jezebel-parodying 30 Rock episode and other instances in which TV responded to online criticism.
• Over at Feministe, our recent guest writer and Zero at the Bone blogger Chally Kacelnik opines about one of my favorite topics: books!
• WTF-turned-good news files: a fetus?! RH Reality Check keeps us up-to-date on Faith 2 Action's, er, odd choice of testifier for Ohio's anti-abortion bill. As it turned out, the fetus "testified" via ultrasound and a heartbeat that was arguably not audible.

Iowa Rep. Steve King reportedly plans to reintroduce a bill that would make English the official language of the U.S. The bill would require those trying to become naturalized U.S. citizens to be tested on their ability to read, write and speak English. It would also require that those pursuing U.S. citizenship be tested on their comprehension of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and related texts. Lastly, it would mandate that official functions of the U.S. government be carried out in English, which could mean that voting ballots would appear in no language besides English.

This bill fails on so many levels.

Gather 'round pardners! It's time for a Douchebag round-up! This week we're featuring three women unafraid to rain their misguided, bigoted, and douchey ways down on the world.