On Our Radar

Another week, another news cycle devoted to John Edwards' sex life. Here are some non-Edwardian links for your Friday!

• Mari Naomi interviews Alison Bechdel in text and comic form! [The Rumpus]
• Why on EARTH is Urban Outfitters selling these "ironic" Mitt Romney t-shirts? [Brokelyn]
• Hey Portland and PacNWers, the Women of Color Zine Symposium is happening tomorrow at Portland State.
• In other PDX news, the Portland Oregon Women's Film Fest (POWFest) is now accepting submissions for next year! Read about submissions here.
• Tami Winfrey Harris covers the coverage of 50 Shades of Grey [Clutch]
• Fangs for the Fantasy recognizes the progress of the reimagined Snow White movies, but points out it it still has huge shortcomings when it comes sexuality, race, and ability. [Racialicious]
• Emily Manuel's wrenching poem is a must read. [Tiger Beatdown]
• According to this report from the 4th Estate, women are significantly underrepresented in 2012 election coverage in major media outlets, even when it comes to women's issues. Sigh. At least the bad news is presented using good infographics? [4th Estate]
• Five Wives Vodka has been banned in Idaho for its offensive label. What do you think? [Buzzfeed]
• Bitch's own Andi Zeisler was on Culture Club again this week! Check out her thoughts on TV and self-esteem, as well as that marriage proposal everyone's talking about. [OPB]
• Shelby Knox reminds us that, three years after Dr. Tiller's murder, anti-abortion terrorism is still a real threat.
• s.e. smith meditates on the "perfect victim" narrative in the media. [This Ain't Livin']

Share what you've been reading/writing this week in the comments!

Do you hear that? It's us breathing a collective sigh of relief because Parks and Recreation was renewed for a fifth season! Time to go out for a breakfast buffet, Swanson-style. But first, links!

• Argentina's senate unanimously approved a groundbreaking gender identity law that allows people to change their listed gender at the civil registry and access medical care like hormonal treatment or surgery as part of their public healthcare.
• Sybrina Fulton, the mother of Trayvon Martin, has made a moving Mother's Day video asking people to support Second Chance on Shoot First, a campaign working to repeal and reform laws.
• At GOOD, Amanda Hess discusses how Vogue's highly-publicized ban on underage, "unhealthy" models won't solve its real problems.
• Niema Jordan is tired of the mainstream media "using black women for clicks" at Clutch magazine.
• Here's a critical-thinking HAES guide for watching HBO's Weight of the Nation documentary.
• Sam at It's Pronounced Metrosexual has a helpful list up of 30+ Examples of Cisgender Privilege"
• Mindy Kaling's show It's Messy has been picked up by FOX! We can't wait to watch!

What have you been reading/writing this week? Share your links in the comments!

• In sad news, we lost rapper, artist, producer, and activist Adam Yauch today to cancer. We'll miss you, MCA.
• Rosario Dawson and America Ferrera are cast in an upcoming indie film on Caesar Chavez. Dawson will play activist Dolores Huerta, Ferrera will play Chavez's wife. 
• Wow. No words for the Chronicle of Higher Education publishing Naomi Schaefer Riley's call for eliminating Black Studies. Read this great response,then sign this petition to dismiss Riley. 
• Kenyon Farrow writes a moving piece on Colorlines about why we should support CeCe McDonald, "'innocent' or not." Speaking of support, here's info on sending mail to her.
• Hey comics industry, here are some tips for illustrating wheelchairs from someone who uses one.   
• At Think Progress, Alyssa Rosenberg writes about Glee's continual practice of exploiting oppressed identities while claiming to do the opposite. 
• After that "Motherhood vs. Feminism" article in the New York Times, Anna North follows up with black stay-at-home moms at Buzzfeed. 
• Crunkadelic is skeptical about Brian McKnight's new "adult" mixtape. 
• Did you see 8th grader Julia Bluhm's campaign for Seventeen magazine to use less Photoshop? Get it, girls. Sign the petition here!

Links for your weekend!

• Bitch contributor Alyx Vesey explores trash talk in Azealia Banks’ “212."
• The postfeminist notion that female empowerment can be achieved through any choice a woman makes—no matter what it is—gets the Onion treatment.
• Feminist conference hoppers! The submissions deadline for both the Allied Media Conference and Geek Girl Con are both due next week! 
• Shakesville introduces a new kind of Personhood amendment, for "women and other people with uteri to establish our rights as autonomous people."
• At Hyphen, Thanu Yakupitiyage deconstruct's M.I.A's video for "Bad Girls" (h/t Racialicious)
• Today's the last day to donate to the Feminist & Queer SXSW 2012 Music Showcase, "Get Off the Internet!"
• Adrienne from Native Appropriations is at a loss for words after seeing stills of Johnny Depp as Tonto from the Lone Ranger movie. Yikes—it does not look good.
• In the wake of Rush gate, Jamie Peck suggests, "Let’s Stop Insulting People By Comparing Them To Sex Workers (And Sluts!)"
• Read Bitch Flicks' review of Friends With Kids and consider supporting women-made media by seeing it in theaters today!
• On the Shameless blog, Julia Caron uses a popular Tumblr post to illustrate which feminist messages seem to get the most traction online. 
• GOOD takes the VIDA byline inventory and applies it to Millennial web outlets to see how where the women are. The Pitchfork stats just might surprise you (in a good way)!
• Viola Davis is making a movie about Barbara Jordan! Yes yes yes!

• Take a look at Disgrasian's piece on the awful racist customer service at Chick-Fil-A earlier this week.
• As if there wasn't enough d-baggery in the corporate world already, the Trans Women's Anti-Violence Project has a piece on a transphobic Macy's employee's "activism."
• Tech blogger Laura Klein wrote an excellent rebuttal to TechCrunch writer Penelope Trunk's claim that women just don't really want to be in the tech biz (Thanks Sarah Y.)
• Portland-based radical plus-size vintage boutique Fat Fancy needs your help! Check out the fundraiser page here!
• Racialicious posted a recap of the dialog (and lack of apology) between Issa Rae and the Awkward Black Girl team, the Crunk Feminist Collective and fans regarding the transphobic comments in the last episode.
• New Black Man pointed out this totes-rad video of Angela Davis speaking with Barbara Becknell (Stanley "Tookie" Williams' representative) at the Occupy Oakland branch of the West Coast Port Shutdown.
• Youth power! A group of Native American youths made a video in response to Diane Sawyer's disheartening portrayal of their reservation on 20/20.

What have you been reading this week?

My, what a week.

• Still reeling from the murder of Troy Davis? Check out "10 things anyone can do to help exonerate innocent people and prevent wrongful convictions" from The Innocence Project, and continue the fight for justice. 
• The first post in a series on queer identity and gaming is up at Yin Soaked Boy. 
• Have you been reading BFP's excellent series on Detroit at Feministe? The latest is on Rick Snyder's welfare cuts and going beyond "Capitalism." 
• Attention non-Native rock bands, fashionistas, hipsters, or anyone that feels the need to wear "tribal" wear, Media Indigena has a letter for you. And at Native Appropriations, Adrienne takes a tour through Urban Outfitters' "Navajo" obsession (behold, the "Navajo hipster panty"), and includes a sample of the cease and desist letter the Navajo Nation Attorney General sent UO several months ago.
• Laura Hudson at Comics Alliance shows how DC's "rebooted" Starfire and Cat Woman aren't sexually liberated superheroines, it's just more of the same old T&A.
• Shadow and Act has some excerpts from reviews of forthcoming Andrea Arnold's Wuthering Heights, which racebends Brontë's novel to feature a black Heathcliff who deals with race as well as class struggle.
• Hey, Seattle-area readers! Do you remember Reel Grrls, the nonprofit that Comcast almost defunded? Well they're having a screening showing student made films about—what else—media justice.

Let us know what you think in the comments, and tell us what's on YOUR radar!

Phew, what a weekend! Why don't you kick back, relax and read some of our favorite posts from the Internet from last week with this special On Our Radar, Special Monday edition! 

• Get ready to toss some rice and shed some tears because Kevin Keller, the first openly homosexual member of Archie comics' Riverdale Gang, is being joined in matrimony next January.
• Minh-ha T. Pham writes about the discomforting and not-so-new phenomenon of eye taping to appear "Asian."
• Remapping Debate horrifies everyone with the simple statistics about constricting abortion regulation in the US.
• Cartoon Movement calms everyone down by educating us about the other side of the war on women's health.
• Alex Vesey sits down and reads Record Collecting for Girls so you don't have to.
• Lena Chen tells us that dating her just because you have an Asian fetish is definitely a dealbreaker (bonus points if you read guest blogger Garland Grey's dealbreaker).
• Amy Rebecca Klein kindly points us to a letter from a man to a woman, telling her that no, she is not crazy.
• The Feminist Peace Network fill us in on some points we might not have thought about regarding the HPV vaccine debacle.

Let us know what you think in the comments!

Hey everyone, take it easy with some of these fine links, hand-picked from all over the web.

• Caitlin Boston gives us some pretty concrete pointers on how to hit on not harass an Asian girl.
• Feministe dances a jig over Nepal's landmark gender legislation.
• Attention students and academics! Of Another Fashion, a Tumblr started by Threadbared's Minh-ha Pham to archive the overlooked fashion of American women of color, is now available on the academic search engine WorldCat. 
• Gamepro doesn't buy the "but no one was supposed to read that" defense after a slur slips into a popular game's code.
• The Huffington Post's fair Canadian branch calls out a supposedly "ethical" pro-oil ad campaign on Oprah's TV network.
• Fbomb reminds us that this whole Dominique Strauss-Kahn ordeal is still bad news.
• The Pursuit of Harpyness decided that her boss is so awesome she deserves her own tribute.
• The XX Factor slap their forehead after reading a psychological study that thinks sex hormones influence your fetus' future career.

Tell us your thoughts in the comments below!

Happy Labor Day, folks! If you have Monday off, take some extra time to read these great links from all over the web.

• Racialicious, close to winding down their series on interracial dating, kicked off a South Asian panel this week. 
• Colorlines responds to Katt Williams’ hateful remarks by showing us five comedians of color we ought to watch instead. 
• We peeked over Racialicous’ shoulder and saw them reading Indiewire’s proposal of a not-so-radical solution to the lack of funding for black indie filmmakers. 
• Former guest blogger Everett Maroon navigates the treacherous relationship between Dancing With the Stars and transfolk. 
• Transgriot reports on a shameful case of transphobia hiding behind a badge. (Trigger warning for transphobic violence.) 
• Slate reports on PETA’s quest to break the record for jaws-dropped-per-minute by launching a porn site. 
• Love is Not Enough declares no, my hair is not a petting zoo.
• FBomb goes back to school and has a high school sophomore call out her classmates for slut shaming.

Tell us your thoughts in the comments section below!

Happy Weekend! Keep your mind sharp for Monday with these links from around the web.

• In honor of the 91st anniversary of the 19th Amendment, Ms. has launched the HERVotes blogging campaign, an effort to mobilize women voters in the 2012 election. Be sure to share your voice!
• Clutch presents 10 Black Women Making Moves in Film. Check these ladies out and show your support!
• Captain Awkward at Feministe discusses The Importance of Casting in Breaking Open Movie Stereotypes. If we want the world to change, shouldn't our movies change, too?
• What Tami Said asks True Blood to stop appropriating the language of equality movements.
• Latoya Peterson shares the disappointing prospects of the upcoming Fall TV lineup in Between a Racial Rock and a Gender Hardplace.
• Geek Feminism Blog examines the problem of geek girls' self-obectification and those ever-popular Leia slave costumes.
• Colorlines notes an increase in stereotypical portrayals of Asian Americans in recent advertisements.
• I Blame the Patriarchy esposes Urban Outfitters's affinity for "teen addict chic."
• Anna Holmes explores another side of Martin Luther King, Jr. in her article "Martin Luther King Jr., the advice columnist" for the Washington Post.

Tell us what you think of these links and share your own in the comments section!