To Hell with Fun
I adore this MIchael Bierut post for a marathon reading of Dante's Inferno.
The Audition
10 Likes, 3 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: "Porn star audition 💫"
An adult performer, who has forgotten her lines, checks the sides on her phone, during an audition for a part in a feature movie, in Los Angeles, California, on December 16, 2017.
How I Became a Journalist
Image via FortWiki
I subscribe to The California Sun, a new California-centric newsletter by Mike McPhate. It includes features like, recently, "When Russia Settled California." I thought I recognized the images. Isn't that where I went on a grade school field trip? I wondered. Indeed, it was Fort Ross, which comes to mind occasionally because that's where I first tried out being a journalist. I believe I was in the fifth grade, and we went on an overnight trip to Fort Ross, which has a program that allows groups to stay overnight at the Fort, and, in doing so, go back in time to experience life at the Fort as it used to be. When I went, various kids chose various roles to play. The person who made butter, I seem to recall, was one. Maybe another included feeding livestock. Instead of going back in time, I chose to be the reporter from the present time who would report back on the trip. I wore a sweater vest. I suppose that was my idea of what a journalist dressed like.
Bulletproof Backpacks and New Porn Stars
1 Likes, 1 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: "Adult performer @therealdelladane at home in North Hollywood, Los Angeles, in the San Fernando..."
Over on my Forbes blog, I've got a couple new posts -- one on a line of bulletproof backpacks that, while not made exclusively for kids, can be worn by kids, and one on a day in the life of a newly-minted porn star.
"Portrait of a (New) Porn Star as a Gig Economy Hustler"
"Her phone lights up with another male performer's name. An actress didn't show up for a scene they're shooting today. Does she want to fill in? It's a boy-girl scene. It'll pay $700.
"Would You Buy Your Child This Bulletproof Backpack?"
"'The idea of a mass shooting has become more of a reality,' Sheikh says. With the ProShield backpack, 'In the event of a shooting, you're protected. Wearing it is definitely a sad reality, but we're kind of in that day and age.'"
Serendipity
1 Likes, 1 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: "My @serenflipity card of the day: "Wear something unexpected." I put on my "Good things happen to..."
Fun with Serenflipity. A deck of cards that turns every day into an adventure. Today mine was "Wear something unexpected," so I put on my "Good things happen to those who hustle" shirt from Fuck Your Hustle, and went to yoga.
Your Fucking Research
Yesterday, a Twitter account called New Real Peer Review tweeted a thread about a research article entitled "On Sex in Fieldwork: Notes on the Methodology Involved in the Ethnographic Study of Anonymous Sex." The research had been conducted by Jose Antonio Langarita Adiego, who is a Doctor en Antropologia Social per la Universitat de Barcelona.
Simply put, Adiego had sex with his research subjects.
As the article's abstract states:
"This article addresses the use of sexual relations with research informants in fieldwork for the purpose of gathering information. The analysis is based on the research that the author himself carried out between 2009 and 2014 on anonymous sexual encounters between men in public places in Catalonia. The article aims to demonstrate that sexual interaction with informants – notwithstanding appeals to scientific objectivity and professional ethics – can be a useful tool for gaining a better understanding of social reality. This study on anonymous sex shows that participating in sexual activity can provide the researcher with a great deal of information which would not be accessible via other relationships with research informants. However, the article also addresses certain limitations – which cannot be ignored – in fieldwork of this sort and in the interpretation of the data obtained."
In other words, Adiego takes the concept of scientific objectivity and explodes it.
On Twitter, New Real Peer Review tweeted a series of screen grabs from the original article (which is available for purchase), highlighting sections and lampooning Adiego's argument.
Indeed Adiego's postulations regarding his having sex with those whom he was researching are as hyperbolic as most academese: "We could resolve the problem by accepting the Foucauldian proposal that sees sex as a social construct," "the practice of anonymous sex is simply one more form of culturally mediated sexual interaction," "Why do anthropologists not experience sex with the groups they are studying?"
Lacking for provocative positioning, Adiego's approach is not.
Shifting to a more intimate analysis, he investigates his own body politic. In the midst of his investigations, he notes: "I could see how the social meanings of cock were constructed in a way that was different with respect to ass." It is only by putting his cock, presumably his balls, and his ass on the front line of his immersive work that he can experience the ways in which this culture works.
His body is "a key factor in understanding"; physical and emotional distance is not only too far from the action but a position of utter blindness: "[being] a spectator was not enough, especially as it was often too dark to see anything." His "bodily experience [...] becomes a source of knowledge in itself which contributes to the ethnographic production." In his conclusion, he asserts: "Sex is a key contributor to the regulation of our culture fabric; we should therefore be able to incorporate sex into fieldwork -- as a technique that helps to maintain a particular mode of relationship between the researcher and the object of study -- without thereby sacrificing objectivity or professional ethics."
This is a true embed, in every sense of the word.
New Real Peer Review doesn't seem to think much of this new, eroticized form of ethnographic study. "Let's make cruising scientific now," one tweet sneers. "Seems legit, bro." Later: "Can't make this shit up."
But is Adeigo's suggestion so absurd, after all? Or is it symbolically and practically intuitively brilliant? If one simply considered this methodology as if it were a thought experiment, what can we learn? To tear out one's hair that this sexualized approach causes a cataclysmic breakdown between researcher and subject is to perpetuate the fantasy that objectivity exists at all between the scientist and that which he studies.
Surely, any scientist -- or any investigator, for that matter -- brings to bear a constellation of biases, presumptions, and agendas. How could he not? He is human. The idea that it is sex, of all things, that betrays the scientific code is possibly a pure fallacy, when, in fact, the reverse may well be true. How can we know something if we know it only in the mind, and not the body?
(Thanks to Lawyer Dog for pointing out the thread.)
Rejections
Image via Judgmental Maps
"I applaud taking on the porn industry and sickos who exploit women at a level pretty much even with human sex trafficking. It's a nice tale of comeuppance. However, it is mostly just a graphic vignette that doesn't represent what our readers are expecting as they read over their lunch or coffee break. We aren't squeamish about profane content, but when the entire scene is essentially X-rated we don't feel that is a fir for our particular publication."
Green
8 Likes, 0 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram
I don't know anything about this architecture, but it looks modernist. Green dots on a grid. Seemingly without any other function than to be aesthetically pleasing.
Whale Shark
1 Likes, 1 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: ""The capture of a female in July 1996 that was pregnant with 300 pups indicated whale sharks are..."
I got into whale sharks late last year when I was working on developing an unscripted series. Whale sharks are amazing. I'd like to go swimming with one.
On the Pod
In January, I'll be on "TV Guidance Counselor," a very cool and beloved podcast from the mind of Ken Reid, in which Ken and "his guests explore the tough television watching decisions of our past." You can read more about the podcast here. I'll update on this blog when there's an air date so you can listen to it online.
The Woodsman
15 Likes, 1 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: "Male porn star @eddiejaye, somewhere in #PornValley on a Wednesday morning #sfvalley #pornstars"
Male porn star Eddie Jaye in North Hollywood. The tattoo below his collarbones reads: "He Who Lives In Fear Will Never Be Free." Follow me on Instagram here.
Snap
Angela Izzo took this photograph of me at home in Los Angeles for a project I'm working on. I highly recommend her: fun, professional, fast. Thanks to Lisa Derrick for the recommendation. The painting in the background is by Chris Bishop.
The Lost Vagina
Image credit: Jen Heuer
Today, my contribution to Lost Objects, "Silicone Vagina," is online. It's a poignant tale involving porn, strippers, and the fake genitalia that got away. It's a true story.
"One night, I got invited to a strip club in the Valley. A famous porn star was dancing there that evening. Her name was Nikki Tyler. She was blonde and buxom and bold, and I recall sitting next to the edge of the stage upon which she was writhing, naked and shining, and she looked like something I’d never seen."
Witness
0 Likes, 1 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: "Letter from Jehovah's Witness ✉️"
Recently, I received a letter from a Jehovah's Witness. From what I could surmise, the sender, a man, thought I authored "Why Women Bully Each Other at Work," which was not written by me but by the lovely and talented Olga Khazan. The letter included an article from the July 22, 1988, issue of Awake!, which is a Jehovah's Witnesses publication. "Even the Bible has not escaped the feminists' wrath," the piece reads at one point. "Millions of true Christian women today are finding the real liberation in filling their role described in the Bible," it concludes. The letter from the man ends: "I thought that you may find it interesting!" I recycled it.
Poke
11 Likes, 1 Comments - Susannah Breslin (@susannahbreslin) on Instagram: "Best poke bowl 🍲 in the #sanfernandovalley is at #torosushipokehouse 💚"
The best poke bowl in the San Fernando Valley is at Toro Sushi Poke House. A+++
Pique This
I'm a big fan of Merriam-Webster on Twitter -- yes, the dictionary -- because their social media is just aces. As someone who used to be a digital copywriter for billion-dollar brands, I know how challenging it can be to define the voice of a product and turn that expression into engagement.
Merriam-Webster does a terrific job of this, sending out a tantalizing stream of tweets that inform, delight, and inspire involvement. Yesterday, they tweeted a link to a post defining the difference between timber and timbre. On Twitter, I suggested they do one on the difference between peek, peak, and pique. (Misuse of these terms drives me nuts.)
Within hours, they'd done exactly that and created a post that dissected the various variations. I even learned a use of pique that I'd not been aware of previously: "Pique sometimes is used to mean 'to take pride in (oneself),' as in 'She piques herself on her editing skills.'"
This isn't the first time I've gotten a nod from Merriam-Webster. Earlier this year, I was quoted in a Merriam-Webster post about "Words from London," exploring "Words with London Origins." They quoted a Film Threat review I wrote years ago of "What Lies Beneath" in which I used the word "gaslighted."
In any case, if you want to see social done right, look no further than the dictionary.
Southie
Image credit: Mark Schafer | Showtime
In a recent Forbes post raving about "SMILF," I referred to its main character, who is from South Boston, is a "southie." Apparently, this was a crime against Boston, and Boston.com called me out for my error. Southie is a place, not a person. I regret the mistake, and I will be more vigilant with how I refer to Southies in the future.
Pornopolis
Star, Las Vegas, NV | Image credit: Susannah Breslin
Here's an excerpt from my novel-in-progress: PORNOPOLIS. In this work of speculative fiction, a superbug has caused all vice industries to be constrained to Las Vegas, which has become a kind of industrial sin city and is divided into seven sections, for reasons you can figure. The main character is Suzanne Flesh, a reporter who works for a newspaper run by a military general. She has a drone for a BFF, connections in the subterranean world in which the real horrors dwell under the city, and in this scene visits Pornopolis, the part of the city devoted to manufacturing all things adult, where she meets one Mr. Offal, its dazzling kingpin.
Seen from the sky, the city was laid out in a circle. At the center, the tourist area held a roughly round shape. Fanning out in segments from there were the city’s seven districts, each focusing on a particular specialty--guns and weapons, food and alcohol, beauty and health, prisons and the judicial system, shadow banks and the stock exchange, the government seat, and the sex work and pornography business.
By mid-morning, Suzanne stood at the gates to the fifth section. The sign overhead read: PORNOPOLIS. It had been years since she’d been here. For the most part, the stories that she focused on took place in the metropolitan area downtown. The serial killer hunting prostitutes. The former journalist decapitating editors. The disgraced CFO with a penchant for robbing billionaires and whales.
A series of sound stages were contained in a massive structure with a curved roof, a former airplane hangar functioning as a manufacturing plant. There were no trees. Someone had killed them.
In the waiting room, she tried to focus on the messages from the General pinging her phone, but the framed images on the wall kept drawing her attention, the faces in them rearranging their features and expressions.
“Mr. Offal will see you now.”
From behind his massive desk, Offal smiled, a flash of brilliant white teeth against brown leathery skin.
“You know you’re always welcome on my sets,” Offal purred.
“Looks like business is booming.”
Offal chuckled smugly. “Boo-ming. China. Huge. Huge market. Developing countries. Exploding. Can’t get enough. Tell you a secret. Vatican City. Great customer. Terrific customer. Can’t say what they’re buying. Their appetite for it, I can tell you, is unholy. Africa. Big big market just now opening up. Very very into albinism. Albino girls very big right now. In Somalia. That’s the secret. Everybody has a niche. Every stomach wants a particular kind of meal. I find out their appetites. I supply it. The feeding trough for the masses' basest desires. That’s me. I’m the chef. I stir things up. That’s what I do. Before your time, the Daily called me 'the P. T. Barnum of smut.' Can you believe that. Very proud. Framed that. On the wall behind me. Without the technology, it goes without saying, I’m nothing.”
She’d spent the morning studying Offal’s file. A boy genius, he’d hacked into the World Bank at eleven and been recruited by the shadow banks not long after that. He didn’t have time to play chess. He was too busy playing checkers with hedge fund managers' heads, distracting them while he picked their pockets with spybugs and black drives. He was married to a profoundly surgically enhanced Ukrainian former pageant queen named Aleksandra. Rumor had it, he was one of the richest men in the city. He’d figured out how to turn a profit on chronic masturbators. He was at the gym every morning by five and drove an armored X-Hov to work. According to the dominatrix she had coffee with and whom he visited every Friday afternoon, Offal liked to be spanked as punishment for wetting adult diapers, the privilege for which he paid her $33,000 an hour. Suzanne had complimented the dom on her shoes and rued, briefly, the career path she should have taken.
“Dolores!” A comely blonde in an OFFAL INC T-shirt appeared. “Take Suzanne wherever she wants to go. My world is yours, Suzanne. Consider yourself my esteemed guest. Make sure to stop by the cafeteria. They do an amazing lobster bisque with truffle oil and capers.”
She followed the blonde to the stages.
Watch SMILF
I wrote a bit of a rave about Showtime's "SMILF." If you haven't seen it, give it a shot.
There's something beautifully raw about "SMILF." You'd think this is some twist on what "Girls" was--a millennial with a mouth, but this one with less friends and a kid from day one. Instead, Bridgette is the anti-Hannah Horvath. She wasn't handed anything, she doesn't fall into holes of self-absorption, she has no time for the endless removing of lint Hannah and her crew were forever finding in their bellybuttons. Instead, Bridgette is busy trying to claw her way into an entertainment industry run even at its lowest level by young men as dumb as they are lecherous, juggling the realities of a son and the curious responsibilities of tutoring the offspring of the lazily wealthy, scrappily pursuing a dream to one day, maybe, play professional basketball. (Yes, a girl.)
No Intervention
I wrote a review of a new HBO documentary called "Meth Storm." Watching this movie is no fun, but that doesn't mean it isn't good. In Arkansas, ice is everywhere.
"Perhaps the wisest and most agonizing choice made by producer/director team Brent and Craig Renaud, Peabody Award-winning brothers whose credits include 'Dope Sick Love' and 'Little Rock Central: 50 Years Later,' was to plop a family down in the middle of this drug-fueled mess. Meet Veronica, a middle-aged mother who's been doing meth for so long she appears to have lost most or all her teeth. Meet Teddy, her son who gets high, goes to prison, gets sober, and, well, you have to watch the movie to find out what happens next. Her other adult children reel in and out of the camera's range and through various impoverished houses in which pets crap on the floor and people cover it up with blankets and clothes. All the offspring are trapped in the tortured struggle of buying into or attempting to escape the ever-whirling vortex that is their mother's seemingly contagious affection for meth in its pure form: ice."