Quote of the Week: Sex Geek [on Avatar of all things]

Generally speaking, when it comes to controversy, I don’t believe in the bizarrely prized activist strategies of a) removing yourself from the conversation (symbolic walk-outs, door slamming, etc.) – because then, the only people left having the conversation are the ones who don’t see what the problem is, or b) criticizing (or buying into other people’s criticism) of things without evaluating the evidence for yourself. I’m all for people having strong opinions, but strong uninformed opinions are just not cool, in my books. Plus, I think that as activists, we need to challenge ourselves to see, read, hear and experience things that make us uncomfortable so that we are forced to question and strengthen our opinions and strategies based on our own perceptions rather than those fed to us.

---- Sex Geek, "Keeping an Eye on the Mainstream."

Heretical Outing ce soir / Word of the Week: p, s, e

Mr. The Engineer and I are going to see an art show at Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal this evening.

I've wanted to see it for sometime and this is the last weekend so it is now or never. The artist is John William Waterhouse a favourite of a good friend of mine. I like his work, although not to the level of a gushing fanboy (not to disparage too strongly the aforementioned friend). His favourite piece is Godspeed. Perhaps you are more familiar O Constant Reader, with Waterhouse's The Lady of Shalott.

A different friend was here at Our Secret Location for lunch and heated discussion (who would have thought that Christopher Hitchens could possible elicit vitriol?) and mentioned, with high praise, that she had gone to the show on cheap Wednesday.

(Note how the main page has a clock counting down the end of the show. In an otherwise tasteful high end musée, it seems a bit tacky. All that is missing is harsh repetitive voice over SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY the LAST DAY DAY DAY FOR WATERHOUSE WATERHOUSE WATERHOUSE! etc. etc.)

*

The Word for this Week is inspired by the exhibit.

Sortilège

Which is French for magic spell or spellbinding. Obviously derived from sor- roots in Latin. It is also an archaic English word (borrowed directly from French) for magical drawing of lots. Also a Canadian Whiskey. How cool is that?