A Need for Chaos

Soft sunshine,

And sweet leaves;

I don’t want them.

 

I want to feel the rain

Beating down on my skin.

I want to feel

Desperation and a hint of defeat,

A reflection in the weather.

 

I’d rather a darting storm

With no element of serenity.

Break the ice with the power

Of a screeching storm –

I need chaos.

 

Let me see the lightning

Flash across the aching sky

As I look up, and relate

To those little explosions

Which everyone pretends to ignore.

 

The sounds of silence are nice,

But I need to hear the world.

 

two months later

 

I said I wanted the rain.

I said I wanted to feel.

But now the storm’s

Just a pathetic whimper,

And I just want to give in.

 

Gracie

x

 

musings from a bad night

Sometimes I dream of death,

And the final feelings of life.

 

I crave the silence –

For all I can hear is the sound

Of my own exhausted,

Desperately beating brain,

Pulsating to the rhythm

Of my own calamity.

 

One day I will leave behind:

The blaring lights,

The screaming voices,

And the expectations I cannot fulfil.

 

My very own heartbeat

Is like the tauntingly ticking clock

Of the prisoner’s cell,

As he waits, with morose,

For his release.

What If Hell Was Heaven

What if Hell was Heaven,

And the Devil’s horns

Glitter in the moonlight,

Yet God’s wings

Blind his onlookers.

 

What if the seas of flames

Were an aesthetic daydream,

Compared to the everlasting lands

Of goodness and purity,

Which are all a little pretentious.

 

What if the roaring lions

And the seething snakes,

Make the blind and pathetic

Lambs of Heaven

Pale in comparison.

 

What if danger is what makes life

Worth living?

What if the things we don’t want,

Are what we needed all along?

 

 

Gracie

x

 

 

Is there a link between being queer and being creative?

On why the queer community uses the arts to express emotions.

Throughout history, members of the LGBT+ community have been known to be the poets, authors and artists of the world. Being queer is at the very heart of classic writers such as Oscar Wilde and Virginia Woolf. I want to understand why this link exists.

In modern times, as well as being the writers, gay people are often also the singers and songwriters. Whether fully out or not, famous queer people are often famous for the music that they have written. Some singers are out, and directly singing about ‘taboo love’ – such as Hayley Kiyoko (who wrote ‘Girls Like Girls’), or Troye Sivan (who wrote ‘Heaven’, a song on the topic of turning one’s back on the Church in order to accept one’s homosexuality). Other singers take a much more indirect approach – take for example Harry Styles, whose unreleased song ‘Medicine’ shocked fans with it’s homoerotic implications. We can even consider Demi Lovato and Rita Ora here, who despite coming out as bisexual, still have to hide their sapphism through metaphor or altering their language to appeal to The ‘Male Gaze’ through the hypersexualisation of lesbian sex.

Now, I must question why this association between being queer and being creative in this field exists. From my experience, straight people feel able to openly discuss their pain, particularly in relation to their love life, without the need to conceal pronouns. Gay people, however, may weaken under the power of internalised homophobia and a heteronormative world. We struggle to express our emotions through direct and concrete language, so we shield it from the pain we expect to feel from the significant minority of a homophobic audience through the use of emotive, yet subjective language.

More recently, I get the impression that many young artists also tend to be LGBT+. In the online world particularly, I see many gay and trans artists depicting their pain through the medium of various art styles. This seems to be for the same reasons as using writing. We produce art on our own and later share it, so we can plan ahead and prepare for the backlash we may face, which straight people hardly even need to think about when discussing their relationships or sexuality. We might not even decide not to share our art in an attempt to protect ourselves.

Plus, I feel as though songs, novels, poetry and art are more empowering than language which is purely functional and entirely shameless. The ability to use language techniques to produce our feelings in a ‘flowery’ style makes queer people feel powerful. Powerful enough to take on the negative, often homophobic, repercussions, even. Referring back to Harry Styles and his song ‘Medicine’, which he sang for every concert of his second tour, it is so evident that his confidence grew dramatically each time he sang it, moving on from shyly singing the words (even mumbling ‘them’, instead of ‘him’) to beginning to include gestures and … hand movements, we might call them.

The queer community uses writing and art to empower themselves in order to overcome the pain – including bullying, abuse, disownment, mental health issues, etc. – which many of us experience growing up as a gay kid. On the other hand of course, we might just want to feel closer to Vita Sackville-West.

Why the f**k should I stop swearing?

The Oxford Dictionary defined swearing as ‘the use of offensive language,’ but why are swear words ‘offensive’? What is it about them that makes society perceive them as rude? Mostly, swear words show extreme emotion, or they present an individual or a group in society as less valuable than others. This is mainly due to connotations (an idea or feeling which a word invokes for a person in addition to its literal or primary meaning). For example, ‘slut’ is so offensive because of the connotations of promiscuity it carries. Interestingly, feminists have been trying to take control of the derogatory word ‘slut,’ by using it in a positive and non-shaming way. In the same way, LGBT+ people are renowned for taking control of the slurs thrown their way, with labels such as “dyke” and “queer” used with a collective and proud meaning. If the meaning of these slurs can change, surely one day it will no longer be offensive, and therefore no longer a profanity?

However, the main purpose of swearing is to express extreme emotion. For example, ‘fucking’ is an intensifier (e.g. “That’s fucking great!”) in the same way ‘really’ or ‘so’ are. All three adverbs modify another word, so why is one seen to be obscene? The very purpose of language is to express our feelings and emotions, and as these profanities aid that, they should not be so deeply stigmatised. Swear words work in the same way as other words — they just have a darker history.

Regardless of the possibly pointless stigma, in some situations profanities may not be the best way to communicate. Swearing can hinder our ability to provide information clearly. For example in a police report, if an eye witness retells the story, by throwing in countless swear words the true event may become lost as it becomes entangled with aggressive and maybe even polysemantic words (a word with multiple different meanings. Take for example: ‘fuck,’ which could get a little bit confusing — or alarming — in a police report.)

At the end of the day, swearing might not be logistically ‘wrong,’ but we should maybe avoid doing it in job interviews, or at the dinner table with our grandmothers.

Until next time,

Gracie.

Finding a career as a modern teen

Being a teenager and searching, sometimes seemingly hopelessly for a career, can seem impossible at times. Such an overwhelming mass of pressure for a task which cannot be done in a few rushed Citizenship lessons can be extremely disheartening, and of little use. Telling my head of year the job I want won’t get me employed; finding employment will.

I appreciate the attempt to motivate students, but how much can truly be done? If deciding a career path is forced upon them, students won’t be self motivated enough to choose wisely.

Young people are expected to make major career choices when choosing their GCSE subjects, which can be intensely panicking when it doesn’t really need to be. Teachers work their students up, insinuating that these options are what defines their future careers. Bare in mind the fact that these students are only 13 years old. From then on, these students join a vicious system of demanding work, terrorising revision schedules and endless stress. If a new career choice is decided halfway through, the student must start again.

It seems illogical to assume that we should have our futures planned out before we have even hit our 20’s, when we haven’t even developed as a person yet. Teenage conformity, angst and anxiety can have a detrimental effect on our self esteem, and consequently our career choices. Living as a student, I hear “F**k this, I’ll be a stripper instead,” at least once a day.

How can we be expected to know who we want to be in 10 years, when we don’t even know who we are now?

Until we speak again,

Gracie.

 

One Small Step For Lesbians; One Giant Leap For Lesbian Stereotyping

Let’s face it: sapphic women struggle to gain representation in the media, whether positive or negative. GLAAD recorded that in 2015, only 17% of all LGBTQ characters on US broadcast television were lesbians. The agonisingly low figure is shocking enough, but what upsets me the most is that this is supposed to be a privilege.

On the other hand, this number is much higher than in previous media. In 2005, the number of lesbian characters on US television series rose to a pathetic 3. Three lesbian characters, out of 110 shows. We have come a long way, but there is much more to improve on.

A major issue with the way lesbians are represented is the fact that the majority are white. From the 2005 GLAAD report, all of the 3 (THREE!) lesbians were white. This just isn’t realistic. Recently, there have been some developments, for example 42% of LGBTQ characters were of colour, although the majority were gay men.

It seems to be that the main media’s audience find gay men entertaining, so it is doubtful as to whether the increase in queer representation is of value. Do we really want representation if it is only for the sake of mockery? Regardless, I find it alarming that gay men are appreciated by the audience, but gay women are discarded. Why are lesbians more taboo than gays? Do gay men only avoid being stigmatised for entertainment?

Onto the stereotypes. When sapphic representation happens, it is more often than not shown as promiscuous and unreliable. A large majority of lesbian films, even those favoured by queer women, feature a woman having an affair with another woman, because she grows tired of her husband. Take for example, Imagine Me & You. In this enchanting whirlwind of a romance, Rachel spots Luce from across the church hall, whilst literally walking up the aisle to marry her fiancé. It’s love (or infatuation) at first sight. As you might expect, Rachel cheats on Heck, her newly wedded husband, with Luce. This is just one of the countless examples of films revolving around a lesbian affair.

I understand that it can take time for some people to realise their sexuality, but this exaggeration is simply not realistic in today’s society. Surveys have concluded that most queer people know of, and understand, their sexuality by the age of 12. Realising an unknown sexual orientation after marriage, and consequently cheating on our partner, does happen, but certainly not the extent presented by the media.

Representing lesbians as cheaters to the mainstream audience enforces stereotypes that sapphic women are debauched and have no loyalty. There is no logic here. It’s almost astounding that these types of stereotypes can be produced purely from the media using lesbian affairs for entertainment.

Hopefully, this, and the stereotypes themselves, will change in the near future. Representation is being discussed much more openly, especially due to the current film Black Panther, which has a 90% black cast. Every day, minorities are slowly creeping in to the media, and it’s incredible to witness.

Until next time,

Gracie.

 

 

 

 

 

Can Grammar Be Sexist?

The English language began developing in the 7th century, and yet grammatically (and one could argue, in life too) women are treated as an afterthought. It is questionable as to whether this is due to genuine misogyny, or the result of grammatical traditions – such as generic masculine terms, for example using ‘mankind’ when referring to the human race as a whole. However, if sexism is not at the root of this masculine generalisation, why is it so difficult for people to use ‘humankind’ instead?

Some might argue that it just sounds ‘abnormal’ to use an epicene, which is linguistic jargon for a non-gender specific pronoun (such as the most commonly debated, ‘they’.) They could argue that they don’t necessarily think women are unequal in worth, but think it excessive to stop using these generic masculine terms. I can’t help but counter these arguments, in saying that refusing to acknowledge that women are seen as a less important and valuable counterpart of these generic masculine terms can certainly be classed as sexism, whether it is a conscious decision or not.

This is because using ‘He’ instead of ‘They’ excludes women from the situation. It reinforces the catastrophic ideology that the world is run by men, women are disposable objects, and that their only purpose is to exist for men’s enjoyment. It makes women seem inferior, which is not only inherently misogynistic but also not up to date with the way women have recently begun to be represented in society.

Take for example, a situation regarding a doctor. You could say, “A doctor should be honest with his patients.” This would imply that all doctors are men; enforcing the stereotype that a woman cannot be a doctor, and consequently leading to women struggling to get employed as doctors. This would mean women are underrepresented in this field, and so, men have the upper hand. As usual. However, if we say instead, “A doctor should be honest with their patients.” we can break this stereotype. All we have to do is change one word.

One of the most common arguments against the epicene ‘They’, is that it is technically grammatically incorrect, with it being a plural pronoun used as a single one. However, the English language is full of irregularities, such as completely illogical spellings, which affects 25% of English words.

The pronoun ‘They’ is not a new phenomenon, so the ‘grammatical traditions’ argument is completely undermined. Shakespeare used it in ‘The Comedy of Errors’ when he wrote, “As if I were their well-acquainted friend.” If Shakespeare could use this pronoun in the 16th century, it is not too revolutionary for it to be used in the 21st century.

Until next time,

Gracie.

The First Step

Here we go. The first step is always a challenging one; the possibilities, whether positive or negative, are endless. Prepare for my ramblings and rantings in the near future.

Perhaps it would be appropriate to touch on my interests, which consist of mainly social issues. In particular, LGBT+ rights are close to my heart, but also politics, the protection of minorities and the struggle of being a young woman living in a patriarchy. Along the way,  I will be discussing and reviewing books and music.

Maybe I have had my heart broken a few times, and I may describe the consequent emotions. Hopefully, that will help you feel less alone. Nonetheless, I will attempt to stop this blog from delving into the waves of my broken-hearted feelings. You and me both know that pieces of sad, sloppy and often drunken writing can be a little bit of a downer.

Looking forward, I hope to become a journalist. You might be wary of this – as people tend to be – due to the high competition in this industry. However, I was always one to believe that ‘the strong will survive’, and will happily dismiss these worries.

For now, we must say goodbye. Let’s talk again soon.

Gracie.