Toffee

ČESKÁ VERZE ZDE This is a rough translation of an article I wrote for Deník Referendum , but since I can't share it on social media in Canada , I decided to create an English version. The translation was created with the help of DeepL (an amazing tool to be used carefully), as I have very little time – I normally write better (I like to think). Photo Spencer Platt, AFP When I found myself in Prague's Klárov district on the evening of 6 February 2016, during a legendarily chaotic demonstration , as a representative of the fading “Sunshine” faction, at one point neo-Nazis ran against us. Immediately all illusions about my own courage left me, I turned and ran in the opposite direction. Then someone shouted, “Don't be silly, it's ours!” And someone else added cheerfully: “Oh, great, anarchists are always fun at demonstrations.” I often feel similarly disoriented today, at a time of pro-Palestinian protests that are sweeping North America, including ...

I have been in a non-monogamy positive environment for so long that I have forgotten that it is actually not a normal thing. I have been talking to people about non-monogamy for about twelve years now, but the benefits of non-monogamy have always seemed so obvious to me that writing about them feels almost boring (just like most social media content about non-monogamy and polyamory is boring – there, I said it, it’s finally off me). So I skipped to its criticism (this is pretty outdated now – if you are interested in an updated academic version of the argument, please let me know: I am in a desperate need of feedback) which now seems to be a bit premature. After discussing it with a friend, I got the impression that I still had something to say about non-monogamy that is both positive and interesting (my friend may have just been being polite and pretending to be interested, but they brought this on all of you). This text will feature a fictional character Amanda, a white woman now p...

How to Have Sex (2023) is a debut feature of Molly Manning Walker that inspired me to a short reflection. This is not a film review and I am of the opinion that if a spoiler spoils a movie, it’s a bad movie but still … there is gonna be spoilers. Also, I really recommend the film. It tells the story of three British teenage girls on summer holidays, looking for fun and sexual adventure. The protagonist is a virgin and wants to experience her first sex but she is also scared of it: the aggressively sexual atmosphere of the beach resort is in strong contrast to her poorly concealed shyness. A mutual attraction begins to develop between her and a boy staying at the hotel next door, but in the end, she ends up having sex with his friend in a semi-violent situation, albeit after giving reluctant consent. I guess I am too much of a millennial and not Z enough to consider it, you know, outright rape. But regardless of the clumsy and selfish sexual act, I will criticize something el...

“There’s not gonna be news on Facebook and Instagram and maybe Google neither soon …” “Where did you get that?” “On CBC News. On Facebook.” “…” “It happened once in Australia but just for a few days.” “How can you delete news on Google? It’s a search engine …” As someone who is not much interested in news in general, I get most of my news from Facebook. Both Czech, Canadian, and international. Some news I get on Instagram, like the news on Iran. Googling news is already a bit advanced for me. This is what happened, in very simple terms: on June 22 this year, Canadian government passed the Online News Act which requires search engines and social media platforms to pay Canadian online news companies when they use their links. Meta (including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) didn’t like this and since yesterday (August 1, 2023), it started blocking all the news content, including online newspaper and broadcasts from abroad. They stated that it is actually the other way rou...

Lives of someone like me and of, you know, “the people” rarely cross and saying that I “know them” is about as arrogant as bragging about (well, “checking”) your privilege that you don't understand “their” problems. Up until recently I had been annoyed by many polyamory discourses because I was thinking that people with existential problems don't really have time for this. But then … no, I realized it's not entirely true. Let me explain. Many years ago, I worked with with a woman from a very different social class who at that time had two and a half jobs, a son, a husband with depressions, and a lover. This situation was stable at least for a few years over which I was meeting her regularly at work. Back then, I had been already for some time living my soap opera life: dramatically falling in love, not being happy, meeting someone new, dramatic break-up, and everything over again. Years later I discovered the concept of “open relationship” which seemed to have solved my p...

I am the lucky one: I have my own apartment. It didn't always use to be like that but I was always dreaming of it. Just to be able to invite anyone to have dinner or to spend the night without having to ask my parents or the owner of the place. Once an ex-girl of my partner whom I hadn't even known that time yet asked me if she could stay at my place for a night. Of course she could. And my partner was angry. "Doesn't she have anyone else in Prague to stay with?" " ... it didn't cross my mind to ask." And I don't know till now. If anyone needs my help, what is here to ask about? When my sister sort of ran away from home and asked if she can sleep at my place, I didn't ask why and for how long. Yes. Without the slightest doubt. (Even though I called my mum a day after to ask what really happened and helped them to make up.) Not long ago a friend of mine told me he might have to interrupt his studies and therefore leave the dorm. "You...

(Česká verze zde .) When I was young I was reading adventurous stories and was dreaming they had been being written about me. I was experiencing Indian, scout, sea, and knightly adventures and was looking for the true friendship sealed by blood. There was the courage in my mind and the strength in my hands and the speed in my feet. I was building shelters, setting up flagpoles, carrying people and wiping off their tears. "And then the occasion arose when I had to meet the man's eyes. An unfamiliar weight burdened me. The real world challenged my claims. As a woman I encounter difficulties in the development of my bodily schema." I have always been the second one, the derived female sex, and one of the many spheres of the man's world. "I resolved, since it was impossible for me to get away from an inborn complex , to assert myself as a WOMAN." I was looking for my feminine energy, tenderness, empathy, kindness. I was touching my body and finally ...

(English version here .) Jako malá jsem četla dobrodružné příběhy a představovala si, že jsou o mně. Prožívala jsem indiánská, skautská, námořní a rytířská dobrodružství, hledala opravdové přátelství zpečetěné krví. Měla jsem v hlavě odvahu, v rukou sílu a v nohou rychlost. Stavěla jsem obydlí a vztyčovala stožáry, nosila jsem lidi na zádech a stírala jejich slzy. „A pak mi bylo dáno čelit mužskému pohledu. Tehdy na mě dolehla neobvyklá tíže. Onen opravdový svět mi upíral můj podíl. V mužském světě jako žena narážím na obtíže při utváření vlastního tělesného schématu.“ Vždy jsem byla ta druhá, odvozený ženský rod, jedna sféra mužského světa. „Rozhodla jsem se, že nemohu-li vyjít z vrozeného komplexu, prosadím se jakožto žena.“ Hledala jsem svou ženskou energii, něhu, empatii, laskavost, ohmatávala jsem své tělo a naučila se mít ho ráda. Chtěla jsem se poddat jeho plodnosti a těšit se z ní. Brzy jsem však pochopila, že má plodivá síla je nedostatečná a že o její zbytky ni...

Filmy klasické hollywoodské éry byly točeny muži (až na jednu výjimku), o mužích a pro muže. Divákovo (respektive divaččino; ta si ovšem musela nasadit mužské brýle) potěšení spočívalo na jedné straně v identifikaci s mužským hrdinou, na druhé straně v pohledu na ženu jako objekt. Dlouhé záběry tváře Rity Hayworth v Gildě nebo v The Lady from Shanghai , jemně rozostřené s pableskujícím světlem na kůži, představují čirou krásu určenou k mužské potěše, Gene Tierney se v první polovině Laury ukazuje pouze jako obraz na zdi, do něhož se hlavní hrdina zamiluje, aniž by znal „originál“, Lauren Bacall v Dark Passage vidí divák zpočátku přímo z pozice hlavního hrdiny, a tak se žena mimo mužský pohled ani ukázat nemůže.* Jak se na filmovém plátně zjevuje žena, popsala mimo jiné Laura Mulvey ve Visual and Other Pleasures . Jakožto postrádající penis představuje hrozbu, s níž se může muž vyrovnat dvojím způsobem: buď ji zneškodní, což je cesta sadismu a voyeurismu (po vzoru Hitchcocka), neb...

Walter J. Ong ve své knize Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word , vydané roku 1982 (!), pojednává rozdíl mezi orální a literární kulturou. Znalost či neznalost písma je podle Onga naprosto klíčová pro způsob myšlení a verbálního vyjadřování, společenské vztahy a všechny ostatní lidské oblasti tímto ovlivněné. Nebyla bych k Ongovi tak kritická jako někteří lidé kolem mě, přestože si jeho vývody nemohu nijak ověřit. Například si nemyslím, že by oblíbené protiargumenty jako INDIE* nebo hebrejština** mohly nějak výrazně narušit Ongovu teorii, a také nemám pocit, že by si zjednodušoval práci rozdělením kultur na dva základní typy (procesu osvojování písma a různým mezifázím se věnuje v samostatných kapitolách, které patří k těm nejzajímavějším). Trochu větší problém vidím v evoluční metodě a z ní implicitně plynoucím hodnotícím soudu (k tomu se ještě vrátím) a v různých poněkud zjednodušených tvrzeních, jako že kniha nepotřebuje (nebo se snaží minimalizovat, což sice není t...

So, like a lot of people, I have started my blog. I have just returned from Austria, where I was snowboarding and skiing and – sort of by the way – celebrating the New Year's Day. I will post some photos hopefully but for now you have to put up with a single photo of me.