Sochi 2014: In Your Face, Homophobes!

Posted on by Kelly Welles

“The games have always been a little gay. Let’s fight to keep them that way.”

Canadian Institute of Diversity & Inclusion

Reports of rampant homophobia in Russia have dogged the build-up to the Sochi Winter Olympics, leaving many political leaders floundering. How to demonstrate opposition to a legislation that has stigmatised homosexuality to the extent that targeted attacks are tacitly encouraged, without rocking a boat already exhibiting distinct and dangerous looking cracks?

FYI, Dave, hiding on the poop deck with a tube of wood glue in your pocket isn’t helpful.

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Movie Watch: Her

Posted on by Kelly Welles

her-poster

“For the first, maybe, 20 seconds of it, it had this real buzz. I’d say ‘Hey, hello,’ and it would say ‘Hey, how are you?’, and it was like whoa […] this is trippy. After 20 seconds, it quickly fell apart and you realized how it actually works, and it wasn’t that impressive. But it was still, for 20 seconds, really exciting. The more people that talked to it, the smarter it got.”

In this quote, Spike Jonze is describing an article he read explaining instant messaging with artificial intelligence. This was ten years ago, but it was this article that planted the seed of an idea that eventually evolved into ‘Her’. ‘Her’ has attracted numerous plaudits, including five Oscar nominations & a 94% approval rating on rottentomatoes.com, but as far as I’m concerned, he might as well be describing the film itself.

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One Direction: Parody With Purpose

Posted on by Kelly Welles

As an elderly person with what I like to think is fairly decent taste, I’ve never really understood the purpose of One Direction as a musical entity. I’m so uncomfortable with the whole ‘mogul grooming and primping boys for the purpose of manipulating the vulnerable, fecund areas of teenage sexuality for financial gain’ thing, that the actual music has passed me by.

The snippets I have heard makes me yearn for the touchingly disorganised and cheery console manipulation of Stock, Aitken & Waterman.

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Dasha Zhukova: Supportive Partnerships

Posted on by Kelly Welles

dasha-zhukova-black-woman-chair-miroslava-duma-buro-247-interview

While Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich is in no way responsible for his partner’s ‘professional’ output, given the number of racial controversies his club have been linked to in recent years, Dasha Zhukova’s decision to promote her new online magazine by posing on a ‘Black Woman Chair’, can, at best, be described as unhelpful.

Image: thesource.com.

Holly Baxter: Another Brick In The Wall

Posted on by Kelly Welles

brick

A blogger from a well known feminist website has copped some serious heat this week after a piece she wrote about crowd sourced funding was published in the Guardian.

It wasn’t so much the subject matter that provoked floods of angry comments, emails and tweets to the Vagenda offices, the Guardian and the social networks, but the springboard she launched her story with – a British musician who had just lost his home, creative output and pet dog in a house fire.

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Tom Daley: Love & Pride

Posted on by Kelly Welles


This kid is nineteen years old. He’s competed at the highest level at his chosen sport while gaining an education and coping with the death of his father from cancer. And yet the first question that springs to some people’s minds when he announces, in a very mature, understated way, that he is in a relationship with a man is “What would your Dad say?” 

Personally, I doubt his Dad would say anything. He’d be too busy bursting with pride, in the same way he did when he watched the son he raised so beautifully compete.

If we all tried to understand that, even for a second, imagine how many young lives might be different.

Fearne Cotton: Keep Quiet & Carry On

Posted on by Kelly Welles

watkins 26 11

If you had asked me in 2000, I doubt I would have gone so far as to call myself a fan of Lostprophets.

Their brand of pop metal, performed by photogenic, heavily modded and moulded boys, leaned a little too close to the accessible mainstream than I was comfortable with at the time, but thefakesoundofprogress was a decent enough album and Shinobi vs. Dragon Ninja still pops up on the odd playlist from time to time.

I don’t think I’m in the majority.

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I’m A Rational Human Being, Get Me Out Of Here!

Posted on by Kelly Welles

 
That awkward moment when a woman who has won two gold medals (the universally accepted zenith of athletic achievement) admits on national television that she still feels worthless because the fact that she is not conventionally attractive is pointed out to her on a daily basis.

Well done, Western Society. Well done. *slow handclap*