Yum & Yuk

Transgender teenager faces criminal charges after defending herself against bullies: Jewelyes Gutierrez's lawyer says the charges further victimize her client, who has experienced repeat harassment. Sign the petition if you're so inclined.

Word: I'm A Trans Woman, But Please Stop Asking Me About My Genitalia: author and advocate Janet Mock breaks down Laverne Cox and Carmen Carrera's appearance on Katie Couric's talk show.

Image: source.

I don't like it, but that doesn't mean I can ignore it: Like It Or Not, Western Yoga Is A Textbook Example Of Cultural Appropriation.

Vice is usually, well, pretty crappy in a lot of ways, but this essay about Instagram and prison visits is worth a read.

Printmaking, local beers, and all for a good cause! Looking forward to this event: Studio@36 Printmaking Patterns: "For the “grown ups” out there, this is your chance to get your hands dirty and unleash your inner artist. (Berets are not provided.) Sponsored by Cape Ann Brewing Co., Studio@36 is a monthly series of art making and networking in the heart of the South End! Each session will focus on a new printmaking technique that will expand your creativity in our historic Children’s Art Centre. All proceeds directly support high quality arts education and programming for children and families regardless of ability to pay."

Prayer of Contrition sent to me by my wonderful pastor in Ashland: "Dear God, you ask only two things from us: that we love you and that we love our neighbors as ourselves. How simple this sounds! But we find the doing much harder than the saying. Forgive us for all the moments in this past week that we have forgotten you and loved other gods the more, and that we have looked upon our neighbors with irritation, anger, fear, or contempt. Thank you for giving us another week and other chances to try to meet your - and our - expectations, and for helping us do better than we did last week."

"There is a contradiction in wanting to be perfectly secure in a universe whose very nature is momentariness and fluidity. But the contradiction lies a little deeper than the mere conflict between the desire for security and the fact of change. If I want to be secure, that is, protected from the flux of life, I am wanting to be separate from life. Yet it is this very sense of separateness which makes me feel insecure. To be secure means to isolate and fortify the “I,” but it is just the feeling of being an isolated “I” which makes me feel lonely and afraid. In other words, the more security I can get, the more I shall want. To put it still more plainly: the desire for security and the feeling of insecurity are the same thing. To hold your breath is to lose your breath. A society based on the quest for security is nothing but a breath-retention contest in which everyone is as taut as a drum and as purple as a beet." - Alan Watts