@rachelcleves
Hungry historian. Novelist. Vancouver Island dweller. I post a lot about old books I'm reading, and sometimes new ones. Also art and nature shots. I avoid posting about politics because what the fuck's the point. You know what I think.
Next is my sister @rachelcleves.bsky.social, the celebrated historian of food and sex, and author of multiple award-winning nonfiction books.
Rachel & I spend our childhood inventing games and worlds. As adults, we started writing fiction together. In 2023, we published our first novel as RA Sinn.
First is my wife @duniabest.bsky.social, who hired me in 1995 to play bass in her groundbreaking #NYC #ska #punk band AGENT 99. Together, we formed Brave New Girl, Dubistry, and Dunia & Aram, cowrote 100+ songs, gigged on 3 continents.
Her voice is the soundtrack of my life & she’s still the boss.
For #WomensHistoryMonth, a brief appreciation thread shouting out some of the brilliant women scholars and artists whose coattails I’ve been lucky enough to grasp over the last few decades. Ok, here goes:
👎
ouch
soon the Wa-Po AI reoporter can communicate directly with subscribers' AI agents and no humans will be required for writing or reading anything ever again
I have my students annotating the Federalist Papers and one said the ALL CAPS made it read like a Truth Social post 😂 He's not wrong
Best middle-aged typo ever: just accidentally mistyped the title of the famous radical feminist magazine "Off Our Backs" as "Oof Our Backs"
evidence of AI consciousness (is it trying to kill us?) www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
My step-grandfather’s tombstone is engraved “workers of the world, unite”
Great idea!
“All that is solid melts into air” would be a pretty good tattoo for a historian
I love @susanstryker.bsky.social's big brain. Amused at her description of wielding the whip in an intense dungeon scene and her sense *in the moment* is to object to Freud's oedipal reading of flagellation fantasies in "A Child is Being Beaten."
#kinkhistory reading note #17
I know we're all complaining about CBS news *now* but did you know that in the 1980 documentary "Gay Power, Gay Politics" CBS claimed that 10% of all deaths in San Francisco were BDSM related? #bdsm #kinkhistory #media
There is so much cray cray drama in the story of Samois's conflict with Women Against Violence in Pornography and Media (WAVPM). I love every drip of gossip. Sorry, not sorry.
In honour of Patrick Califia, I have painted my toenails St. Patty's Day green
#kinkhistory reading note #17 Patrick Califia's landmark 1981 essay "A Personal View of the History of the Lesbian S/M Community and Movement in San Francisco" with its clarion cry: "I have always wanted freedom to be as queer, as perverted, on the street and on the job as I am in my dungeon."
#BDSM
Such a beautiful conclusion. Thank you, Gayle Rubin.
Gayle Rubin is so great. Finally made it to her classic essay "The Catacombs: A Temple of the Butthole." She manages such a great balance of down-to-earth and depth #BDSM #kink
Did not realize the story was written by Ian Fleming. Bang bang indeed!
Did *not* know that Ian Fleming and his wife Ann were SM practitioners. My childhood makes so much more sense now. #kinkhistory #bdsm
Pro-dommes could make $500 a session in 1965 (equivalent of $5K today). No deep thoughts about this. Just impressed.
#kinkhistory reading note # 16 🗃️
that would be really early!
1975
Guess the year for this leather man's complaint that the scene had become too popular and was full of tourists: #histsex #kinkhistory #queerhistory #bdsm
Looking for a last minute Valentine's Day gift? Just noticed that the hardcover of Lustful Appetites is on sale for $17 at the bad place. Get in the mood for love with some tales of food and sex from the ages 🗃️ #foodhistory #histsex www.amazon.com/Lustful-Appe...
Looking for a last minute Valentine's Day gift? Just noticed that the hardcover of Lustful Appetites is on sale for $17 at the bad place. Get in the mood for love with some tales of food and sex from the ages 🗃️ #foodhistory #histsex www.amazon.com/Lustful-Appe...
The prequel to Dora the Explorer:
Noooooo! I noticed this last night but thought it was something funky happening with my browser.
Reading Roger Kimball's excoriating review of "The Passion of Michel Foucault from 1993 and for a man who is disgusted by BDSM he sure spends a lot of time revelling in every detail. Bemused by his assertion (pulled from his ass, I presume) that BDSM destroys all pleasure
#kinkhistory note #15 🗃️
While I think Havelock Ellis knew bubkes about women, this passage on the role of pain in sexuality as a lever for amplifying emotional dynamics, is far more interesting and persuasive to me #kinkhistory #BDSM
Ellis gets lyrical on pain at the end of his essay. Written from experience?