This week’s list is all over the place. We’ve got hippy shit. We’ve got lit shit. We’ve got politics shit. But as my Dad likes to say, “It’s all good.”

So, your recommended reading:

In Praise of Micromastery

by Katherine Martinko

This story is an example of micromastery, the idea that people can (and should) engage in learning new skills just because. Forget about the 10,000 hours required to become a true master, as they say. How about one hour, or even two or three? There’s a lot one can learn in a short time, and a tremendous amount of pleasure to be gained.

Validation! (I was complaining about this the other day). I haven’t read the book, but maybe I will someday, once I can start getting books again (I told myself no new purchases until after the impending move…because moving is expensive) and/or have access to a better library (not that I don’t love the Vaughn, but they do have a pretty limited selection). Anyway, read this.

HI, I’M A RECOVERING PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT ADDICT

by Jennifer Lowe

I spent thousands of dollars on coaches who promised results — but mostly got me an emptier bank account.

Anytime I read sales copy, I couldn’t resist the urge to click the shiny button that said “YES! I want to double my sales / get flatter abs / have kinkier sex!”

This is so good on so many levels. So good. I have a dear old friend who flirts with this sort of thing from time to time (both as a consumer and producer), and we kind of laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, and this is perfect. Highly recommended reading.

DIY Project — Easy, Safe Herbicide

by the Low Technology Institute

Many people are avoiding glyphosate, also known as RoundUp™, but still have to deal with plants in unwanted locations. If weeds are left to grow in the cracks of walkways, the cement or pavers will be dislodged over time, for example. Perhaps a nasty invasive has started to take over an area. Tony B., a good friend and fellow founder of Deep Green Garden Co-op, turned me on to “Not RoundUp.” It’s a simple recipe that will take care of most plans for about a year.

The LTI was started (at least in part; I haven’t had a chance to see him in a while to get the full story) by a friend of mine from a political reading group back in St. Louis. They do cool shit, check them out, and also this really is a great alternative. Now if only I had space for a garden…

SILENCE IS AN OCCUPATION ALL ITS OWN: SPEAKING WITH MICHAEL CHABON AND AYELET WALDMAN ABOUT ISRAEL AND PALESTINE

by Ilana Masad

MC: Right, and the thing is there would be no occupation without American financial support. The other thing, too, is that the prohibition, that attempt to silence any kind of commentary by “outsiders,” is a version writ large of something that happens with domestic violence. There was a time when, if a man was battering his spouse in his own home, that was his business, and you as a neighbor or anyone else, a so-called outsider, had no right to intervene—which is clearly wrong, and it’s now understood that we have a responsibility to intervene. To respect the prohibition on commentary by outsiders is to enable the violence.

I’ve mentioned this collection before, linked to the Chabon essay in there in an earlier WWRR post, and I am still very, very excited about the collection they’re talking about in this interview. Also, this is just a very good and interesting read all on its own.

Wipe Your Butt and Hit the Road, These Are All the Tour Tips You Need

by Rebecca Henderson

People will be nice to you because they think you can help them get where they want to go: specifically, into the intimate lives of your musician friends. They don’t want to know your childhood pet’s name or how you ­feel about the failure of Esperanto. But do you have a Sharpie? Do you have this shirt in a medium? Can you give this to the band? And you do, and you can: because tonight, you are their bridge to a fantasy. And yeah, maybe they will follow you on Instagram, and occasionally, sure, they might want to wear your skin. You’re the ugly one for now, but the drinks are still free, so really who cares? Just sit back and enjoy the show you glorious monster: Everyone in the van is still sleeping on the same floor tonight anyways.

The Screaming Females are fucking awesome, this was a cool essay, and music is great.

The Diminishing Returns of a College Degree

by Richard Vedder and Justin Strehle

Well… it’s behind a paywall now. So maybe less recommended. But I enjoyed the article, and would have written something about how I’ve seen the effects of this in my own life and in the lives of my friends… but the paywall.

How the Alt-Right Is Using Sex and Camp to Attract Gay Men to Fascism

by Donna Minkowitz

Of course, neither O’Meara nor Donovan actually support gay rights. This is partly because they don’t believe in “civil rights.” Although O’Meara wants to be part of an imagined elite band of men who love each other and rule society—his version of an Aryan fantasy called the Männerbund—he doesn’t want to support, as he put it in the interview with Alternative Right, “some sniveling queen demanding ‘my rights!’ … ‘The plight of the homosexual’ … is a Leftist myth.” Donovan says explicitly that straight people should be given more power and privileges than gay folks, because their “reproductive sexuality” is superior to ours. Both men openly detest lesbians and trans and genderqueer people: Donovan calls the trans movement “men who want to cut their dicks off and women who want to cut their tits off.” And of course, no white nationalist organization anywhere supports LGBTQ rights on a social or legislative level. Their new “support” is limited to allowing cis gay men who are white racists to join them.

This article was super interesting. I remember hearing something about this around/after the election, but… crazy shit. Also interesting to note that, as Minkowitz points out, they’re basically stealing this tactic from extremist-Right groups in Europe. So anyway, scary, but recommended reading all the more so because of it.

FROM PENELOPE TO PUSSYHATS, THE ANCIENT ORIGINS OF FEMINIST CRAFTIVISM

by Stephanie McCarter

But it would be wrong to read Ovid’s story as an unambiguous lament for Philomela’s plight; his epic, after all, contains one story after another of brutal rape. And her tale suddenly transforms to become an illustration of the impious violence of female vengeance. The sisters murder the young son of Procne and Tereus, cook his flesh, and serve him to his own father. Philomela’s capacity for craft is outdone only by her pursuit of vengeance. As Patricia Klindienst suggests in a landmark essay, we must fashion our own meaning out of Philomela’s story: “If the myth instructs, so does Philomela’s tapestry, and we can choose to teach ourselves instead the power of art as a form of resistance . . . We have now begun to recover, to preserve, and to interpret our own tales.”

I enjoyed this a lot.