mightyfastpig

10:32 am: Election season
As far as I'm concerned, the most pivotal election of this season was decided on Saturday night at MVK's second annual general election.

I assumed that either I'd be elected president again, or I'd have to accept the director at large position. However, I instead took the vice-president nomination.

Now, I'm vice president, which is actually pretty good. I'm still involved, but I don't feel like I'm responsible for everything in the organization. Congratulations to R. as the president, G. as the treasurer, g. as the secretary and the old and new people serving as directors at large, as well as M. as the new ombud position.

Furthermore, my worst case scenario was that there wouldn't be enough interest to form a new board and the organization would fail due to lack of interest. Instead, the system worked. We had an election, resulting in a new board with a mix of old and new people, as it should be. The organization has proved robust enough to last another year. This is exactly what I hoped would happen when MVK was founded in September 2007.

Tags: mvk

11:04 am: Counter-factuals
I've been reading a lot about antebellum American slavery and particularly Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, as part of the research on BDSM history.

Looking backwards from 2008, it's easy to see American slavery as something that had to be stopped, and assume a manifest destiny assumption that it would be stopped. But I'm not a determinist, and I believe history could have unfolded some other way.

What I'm wondering is, would American slavery have ended without the violence of the Civil War? (According to Wikipedia, 620,000 casualties in total.) There's the related question of, was it morally right to go to war to end slavery, among other reasons? (How much of the Civil War was really about slavery is a debated point, but it was certainly a strong issue.) And were there preferable alternatives?

People who grappled with the question of slavery in Amerca had several potential futures in mind. Many of them did not involve assimilation of blacks into white society. Stowe, at least in her books, seemed to be in favor of recolonization. Blacks in America would return to Africa, bringing Christianity and presumably other elements of modernity, and create a new nation there. Only a handful of writers saw familial and social mingling as the solution to America's racial divide instead of a taboo.

One could argue that, in the long run, slavery as an economic and social system couldn't work, and it would have eventually broken down. Perhaps peacefully, perhaps not. The agrarian/feudal Confederate states couldn't compete economically with the industrialized Union states.  But there could have any number of intermediate cases for the position of blacks in American society that would make Jim Crow look like nothing.  Would allowing that have been "better" in some larger historical sense than four years of brutal war, more than half a million dead and cities burned to the ground?

This is the kind of thing that can be debated forever. One can cite this and other examples, like the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or America getting involved in the European theatre of WWII, in arguments that going to war is strategically and morally justified, and the rationales for the Iraq war go by just that. Invading Iraq would end a monstrous regime and stabilize the region, we were told.

The outcome, however, is somewhat different. People who practice statecraft are very much in the business of making history, of planning the fate of nations. Sometimes that has positive outcomes, and sometimes it doesn't. Even if those who decide are not compromised or corrupt, there are so many variables that there are no guarantees. We may never know what the leaders of post-Saddam Iraq decided or failed to decide.

If we can't predict the outcome of large scale actions without a reasonable degree of accuracy, how do we decide?



Tags: history

09:40 am: Welcome to the world, Mira
My brother phoned me this morning to say that he and my sister-in-law are now the parents of their second child, Mira, a healthy newborn. Yay!

Tags: family

11:10 pm: My interview with Jack Rinella
My second ever audio interview is now on Jack Rinella's Leather Views podcast. Hopefully this can bring in some new readers.

Tags: bdsm, podcast

10:10 am: Stories change
For example, I recently re-read EB White's "Charlotte's Web" for the first time since I was a child. I remember loving the relationship between Wilbur and Charlotte, and Charlotte influenced my feminine ideal: intelligent, worldly, caring.

Now that I read it again, Charlotte seems different. She's distant, for one thing. I don't think she touches Wilbur in the entire book, though granted she's tiny relative to him. She's bossy, when she tells Wilbur to run around, and doesn't involve him in her planning. She also rambles about things that are of no interest to Wilbur.

I also wonder why people are so impressed with the pig instead of the spider, as Mrs. Zuckerman suggests. I think this has something to do with White's commenting on advertising.

In "The Empire Strikes Back", I always thought that, at the end of the confrontation with Darth Vader, Luke is so stunned by the revelation of his parentage and the loss of his right hand that he just passes out and falls off the platform. It's only by luck and/or the Force that he gets sucked into the vent and doesn't fall all the way.

When I saw the scene again recently, I had a completely different take. Luke briefly glances down into the chasm, then back at Vader, then allows himself to fall. Another shot shows Luke in almost a skydiving position on his way to the circular vent.

An apparently minor change, but with huge ramifications. The basic idea is the same, that Luke would rather die than join the dark side. However, instead of Luke giving up and being willing to die, only to be saved by an external force, Luke escapes Vader by grasping at a thin but definite hope for survival.

Anothe example is Moore and Gibbons' "Watchmen". There are so many intricate details in the story that it is full of things you notice on re-readings. On the first few pages, I noticed that when Daniel is walking towards his kitchen, his hands are in fists and his shoulders are squared. He may not be Nite Owl anymore, but he can still handle what he thinks is a random prowler.

Likewise, Dr. Manhattan doesn't leave Earth because he's worried that he's emitting harmful radiation, or that he isn't human anymore. He leaves because Ozymandias' machinations make him realize that he's still human enough to panic, to make rash acts, and for a being with nearly unlimited power, that's unacceptable. The whole business with him and Laurie on Mars is him trying to make her break up with him, so she feels she has some control.

So, stories change in the telling and the reading and the remembering. They're all acts of interpretation.

Tags: writing

10:17 am: Latest book review
My review of Cory Doctorow's YA novel Little Brother is now up on the Tyee.

I've got a quick informational piece for the Courier on the go as well. My current temp job is doing customer service via phone and email for a photo processing web site, which I do 2pm-10pm Thursday to Monday. It messes up my circadian rhythms, such as eating a full dinner in the afternoon and sandwiches at night) and by 10pm, everything is closed. It's also putting a crimp in my social life and I have to keep giving up work days for family events and MVK stuff.

You'd think that having full access to other people's online photo albums would be interesting, but frankly, one set of baby pictures looks pretty much like any other. I suppose it is the "All happy families..." principle at work.

Slick last night was... well, I have mixed feelings about it. Attendance was pretty good, considering it was a new and different event on a weeknight. We scheduled it from 7pm-1am, but after about 11pm, the only people coming in were the venue's regulars. Another significant issue is the meeting of two very different cultures: one in which you're supposed to keep a fair distance from people playing and only get involved with an explicit invitation, the other in which the safe distance is much smaller and joining in is much more casual. A third point is that MVK's Vancouver Dungeon parties are held in an auditorium, in which everybody can see everything. Slick had public areas, but most of the action was in the private rooms.

On the upside, I like the lockers, and I enjoyed the earlier phase of the night, when lots of MVK people were arriving and getting to know the venue. The people seemed to enjoy themselves.

Tags: work, writing

09:32 am: This needs to be said
“Let us face a pluralistic world in which there are no universal churches, no single remedy for all diseases, no one way to teach or write or sing, no magic diet, no world poets, and no chosen races, but only the wretched and wonderfully diversified human race.”

“Finding oneself was a misnomer; a self is not found but made.”

-Jacques Barzun

Tags: philosophy

11:30 am: My first podcast interview
Yesterday, I was interviewed by Jack Rinella for his Leather Views podcast. This is my second BDSM history-related audio interview, but my first that will be aired only as a podcast. The other was on UBC-radio station CITR's JuiceBox radio, which also podcasts. It should go online in 3 weeks or so.

I am a big fan of podcasting. Since I got my MP3 player and broadband, I almost never listen to broadcast radio. I subscribe to many sexuality, writing and tech podcasts, plus listen to free audiobooks from Podiobooks.com. Podcasting has lower barriers to entry than radio, and is far more flexible in terms of time and content. 

09:26 am: My article on sex work decriminalization
To my surprise, my article on the decriminalization of sex work in Vancouver is up on the Tyee, front page top story no less. (Thanks, David!)

This is my first news-feature in a while, and I got a little nervous about covering such a complicated issue with so many divergent points of view and strong feelings attached.

Personally, I'm in favor of decriminalization. When you look at the people who are being chewed up and spat out by the sex industry, that's not an issue of sex, that's an issue of poverty. The prostitution is just the most visible and emotionally charged aspect of the larger social problems of drug addiction and poverty. I once had an argument with a friend who didn't understand why I didn't consider banning child pornography a higher priority, when she considered it essential to protecting children. I explained that, of all the children living in wretched and exploitative conditions in the world, most of them don't end up on film. Better child protection laws would help far more children than cracking down on child porn and weakening freedom of expression.

The sex industry is, if you'll pardon the expression, a "dark continent." Everybody knows it exists, but there is little hard information on how many people are involved, how much money moves through it, how the people within it behave. In the absence of facts, there are myths and legends, some romantic and some horrifying, propagated by a special, liminal caste of people who are not natives and who simplify a vast, diverse and complicated culture into simplistic narratives.

The really interesting development in this story is people who are sex workers forming their own organizations and speaking for themselves. That's the only way the sex industry and the people in it can stop being abject pariahs, the dark underworld.

No comments have yet been posted on the Tyee story, but I anticipate some strong feelings.

Tags: journalism, work, writing

01:20 am: "Sparkers" story
My flash story "Sparkers" is live on Everydayfiction.com. Please visit, comment and pump up the rating, thank you.

This is my second story inspired by my research on ibogaine and psychoactive substances.

Tags: fiction, science fiction, writing

11:14 pm: My ibogaine story finally online
After about a year and a half, I finally published a story based on my research on ibogaine, an experimental treatment for drug addiction. It's in the July-August issue of THIS magazine.

I've been very busy the last few days, between temping, MVK meetings and trying to finish the three Tyee assignments I agreed to in a fit of optimism. I did submit the review of Cory Doctorow's Little Brother on time, but the prostitution decriminalization story is taking a while, and I haven't even started the other book review.

Plus I need to revise and expand my steampunk erotica story by Monday.

Tags: work, writing

11:00 am: Latest presentation a sucess
My BDSM history presentation at the Art of Loving last night went surprisingly well. A friend came through with the LCD projector, which always makes it better. I've done it with only my laptop screen before, but it doesn't work with more than a few people.

Even though only two people registered in advance, six people attended. Why, oh why do people not register in advance for something when every newspaper announcement, blog post and other piece of promotion I made say that registration is necessary? If there isn't at least two people registered at the venue, it won't go ahead.

I try to add new material every time I do it, and this time I added a lot more modern material: the founding of early hetero organizations in the early 1970s, professional artisans and publishers around the same time, the pansexual movement beginning with the NLA in 1987. A lot of this was based on my interview with Jack McGeorge.

I wonder how close I am to having enough material for a book? I don't know. In theory I could research this forever, adding new material, but accumulation of data is not the same as writing. To do the book justice, I think I'd have to travel, to the Leather Archives in Chicago and probably the Kinsey Institute archive in Indiana, and do some really solid research. Also hopefully track down people who were involved in the early days of the hetero Scene and interview them.

Tags: history, presentation, work

12:52 pm: Paths to the future
On Thursday, I met with an editor who's been a great support to my career over the years. Over chai latte and tea in a coffee shop on the margin of gentrification of the Downtown Eastside, he told me something that was considerable food for thought.

The way to make it through the fabled dollar-per-word barrier of freelancing, he says, is adopting one of two strategies:

The first is the path of the stylist. You develop literary chops and practice Tom Wolfe-style New Journalism. What you write about is less important than your particular artistic interpretation of it. You build a literary reputation and get called upon by editors for assignments.

The second is the expert. You develop in-depth knowledge of and contacts in a particular field so you can stay abreast of new developments and be ahead of the curve. You become known to editors as the go-to person for that topic. Write enough features on something, and that can eventually turn into a book deal or speaking engagements.

Of the two, the former sounds like the harder path. Literary stars come and go, decided by the vagaries of fashion. Expertise has staying power. Secondly, trying to write stylistically sounds exhausting, as if it isn't hard enough to write at all. More utilitarian prose is less flashy but is more accessible.

I have my niche topic, actually my niche of a niche topic, but the editor suggest that I have broader interest expertise: sex and tech. However, I have no interest in writing relationship advice or tech journalism pieces either.

Tags: journalism, work, writing

12:03 am: It's all about the attitude
While I intended to submit The Innocent's Progress on Tuesday, I only got it finished, printed and in the mail for Circlet Press on Wednesday. My typical procrastination. Now I'm stewing over whether there are any uncorrected errors, or if the sex is plentiful enough or sexy enough. I'm not even sure it qualifies as erotica. It's about people who are basically sex workers, though in a culture where this is not a denigrated profession, but there aren't particularly detailed sexual descriptions. Then again, Sacher-Masoch's Venus in Furs is not terribly explicit either.

Incidentally, International Reply Coupons are a total scam on the part of Canada Post. I only used them because Weeda stamps, where I used to go for American stamps for return envelopes, had apparently moved or closed.

My book review on the Tyee produced, in the comments, an Apple vs. Microsoft argument and some posts about Bill C-61 itself. I felt a little guilty for writing what I saw as a harsh review, as I had asked for author for a review copy. In the interest of good faith, I told the author about the review. To my surprise, he said it was a great review and agreed with my main point of criticism. This attitude may be part of the reason why he has a book in print and I don't.

09:29 pm: That sickening feeling
My latest non-fiction work, a review of Matt Mason's The Pirate's Dilemma, is now live on the Tyee.

Over the past year or so, my freelancing traffic has dropped significantly. There are several causes for this: MVK duties, an illness in the family, a relatively steady run of temp work, but a lot of it is just demoralization.

I received a call from the editor about making a last minute addition to the piece, with a few hours notice. This was not a difficult task, as it would only involve a paragraph or two and it concerned an event I was already following in the news. I finished it ahead of deadline and even had time for a quick polish as well.

The problem was that I felt sick afterwards, like I'd been in a car accident or some other sudden situation of violence. The tired yet jittery hangover of an adrenaline rush. I think this was because the thought of making a mistake put me into a fight or flight reaction.

Writing fiction doesn't do that me. (With that, what holds me back is the lack of belief it will matter to anyone, even if published.) Journalism, however, has the potential to hurt someone if done poorly. When I see examples of incompetent or corrupt journalism, I take it personally. And when I make mistakes, it hits me hard. Fear of that holds me back.

The other piece of writing I'm working on now is an erotica/social science fiction piece for Circlet Press' steampunk anthology. I have a soft spot for Circlet Press, as they published one of my very first fiction pieces years ago, and it was a white elephant piece that was significantly longer than the other pieces in the anthology. It qualified as a novelette. Yet, they published it, and even put it at the end of the anthology. The piece I'm working on, The Innocent's Progress, is something I'm quite proud of, but it's a neither-fish-nor-fowl piece that I don't know if it could be published anywhere else. With this, what's holding me back is the thought of it not being accepted: not erotic enough, not fantastic enough, not steampunk enough.

I've been researching Victorian theatres for the past few days, so I will put in as much setting detail as possible, then print it on Tuesday and send it off.

Tags: work, writing

09:22 am: Last history presentation
My last history presentation went well. I didn't manage to borrow a slide projector, but I just used my laptop screen and it worked okay. I'm not sure it would work with more people attending.
I did a rather poor job of promoting it, but considering that my presentation was well attended, with three people coming out to Little Sisters. I'd like to do it again, properly this time. 

09:31 am: It takes a lot of work to make this much play
It's the first Saturday of the month again, and that means a 16-hour or more work day. I'd hoped that, after doing this so many times, it would get easier. The procedures would be settled, we'd have enough people, and everything would just boot up smoothly. Instead, it feels like every month we do the opening sequence from Saving Private Ryan.

According to Time out of Time, Carnival in Rio de Janeiro looks like a wild, spontaneous, libidinous outpouring of pleasure and communitas, but there's actually a large, sophisticated and well-organized bureaucracy behind that making it all possible. I imagine the same can be said of Burning Man and similar events. People going to it get a good dose of liminality, even communitas, the oceanic, belonging experience of open possibilities, but the people running of it experience it as a perpetual logistical crisis.

Or maybe I'm going into this with the wrong attitude. I can be a bit of a stress puppy at times (an aspect of masochism?). I do know that taking a few breaks certainly helps, along with just generally unclenching.

10:28 pm: First line in need of a text
This should go at the beginning of something:

Our platoon's sargeant had PVSE tattooed on the knuckles of his right hand and, of course, PVSP on the left.

Not sure what.

Tags: writing

12:22 pm: Open letter to everyone who uses a word processor application
Actually, this is more intended for those who use word processors to write anything beyond letters and the like.

If you are or ever will write anything with multiple sections, headers or any other kind of formatting...

Please, please, please learn how to use styles and templates.

I know there's a bit of a learning curve. I know that MS Word can be a pain in this regard, particularly if you want to use bullet or number lists, or tables. I know that it requires a mental shift to separate the content of a document from its form, but it's worth it. Styles, done properly, make a huge difference in cleaning up and formatting a document, turning tedious drudge work into a quick delight. Imagine not having to hunt through an entire document and make individual changes because you want your headers to be 2pts larger. Imagine having a constantly updated roadmap of your entire document you can refer to in a side pane.

MS Word, like it or not, is the default, and I believe that the vast majority of users understand only a tiny fraction of its total abilities. They may also know how to use a particular function that directly relates to their work, such as mail merges, but they don't know the deeper functions that are applicable to many different uses. Styles should be understood as fundamental to using the application, as fundamental as layers are to Photoshop or formulas are to Excel. And yet, they aren't.

This goes for OpenOffice.org Writer (basically an MS Word clone) users and users of any other word processing software that includes the function.

Tags: work, writing

12:27 am: The importance of being distracted
I've discovered that I score better at the Tetris knock-off installed on my cell phone when I am partially distracted. If I over focus, I don't score as well.

I wonder if the same thing applies to writing. I've written two short news items while working for somebody else, including interviews, research and composition. Nervously looking over my shoulder seems to help me buckle down and finish something. They weren't the high points of my journalistic career

The same thing happened with my submission to the Holy Sex anthology. I had the story worked out in my head: an immortal woman who was the model for the woman with black wings in Pompei's Vila of the Mysteries mural discovers the modern Scene. But it took me forever to get into it, and when the deadline was closing in, I still hadn't finished it and run it through my workshop. Still, I pulled it together in slow moments and lunch breaks at work and sent in a passable draft on the deadline day.

It may not be great literature, and probably could do with a rewrite, but it is done and furthermore submitted. To be honest, I don't get to those points as often as I'd like. I started rewriting my fantasy novel trilogy, The Brother's Witch, but I find myself far more interested in writing short stories than novels. I wish there was a bigger, better paying market for short stories.

Incidentally, I'm a little distressed by the writers I know who, when asked what they want to write, say, "A five or six book series." (That's like saying, "My band? We're the next U2." or "My business plan? We're the next Google.") The notion of a self-contained short story seems foreign to them.They do huge setting bibles, and story and action are secondary considerations. Yes, Tolkien and Herbert did it, but A) they were geniuses and B) they did it first.

That's why I like and read flash fiction. It forces economy, it's usually idea-focussed, and it teaches you that some ideas are good, but only worth 600 words. A flash story doesn't take over your entire mind for years. It's something you think about for a while and then move on. You separate the process from the product.

Tags: writing