Dear Jen Van Meter, Thank you for doing more with one post to raise the level of discourse in the comics community than the whole blogosphere could manage in years, and for owning your work and responding to criticism thoughtfully and respectfully, and for putting a lot of thought into the stories you write even [...]
When summer kicks into Portland, it kicks hard, and my shitty apartment (oh, how I loathe this place. But now is not the time to talk about mold, ridiculously inept construction, or tragic lack of rent control laws) is not air conditioned, which means the temperature in here is about two hundred and seven degrees [...]
My mom is unbelievably badass. She has a Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry and rides a big damn motorcycle. She’s politically active and involved in ecology and sustainable design. But none of that can hold a candle to what she does for a living: she teaches middle school. She doesn’t do this because she lost a [...]
This isn’t a proper post—that’ll go up later tonight, or tomorrow—but I wanted to take a moment to thank you for your overwhelmingly positive response to “Ma, Can I Be a Feminist and Still Like Men?” I tend to brace myself for the worst possible reactions, and I was thoroughly prepared to be lambasted as [...]
*With apologies to Nicole Hollander. Yes. You can even be a queer feminist who likes, loves, and fucks men, because being a feminist and queer activist is all about fighting for the right to be who you are and love whom you love without apology or shame. On the same premise, you can be a [...]
I didn’t go to New York Comicon, so I didn’t get to see the panel on “Capturing the Female Reader.” It’s probably just as well that I wasn’t there: it would have been awfully hard to resist making a loud, snarky comment about bear traps (I mean, seriously–could they have given it a sillier title [...]
Since last week, I traded content for style, this time, I’m going to introduce myself and “Inside Out” a little less dramatically and give you a clearer sense of what I want to do with this space, and why. As I hope you’ve already realized, I’m Rachel. I’ve been a comics fan for at least [...]
I am writing this communiqué from deep inside enemy territory. I have scaled barbed wire fences and tunneled under stone walls. My hands are raw, my glasses are cracked, and I can’t feel my toes. I am, as they say, “in the industry.” I make comic books for a living. Okay, I edit comic books [...]