Friday Night Chats / Friday day chats?
Hello! Welcome to Friday Day Chats - it's usually Friday Night Chats, but I figure you're stuck at home with this terrible weather too. So we may as well hang out. Today's chat is going out to everyone as a reminder of what you get if you're a paid subscriber (and because it's a long weekend and it's Matariki!) Every Friday, we host chats here and have a great time. Please join us!
Feel free to skip to the comments if you read this already in your email!
I love Matariki. It's a special time for our whānau. This year it's extra special because my husband and son will be seeing the Matariki cluster from their whenua in Rēkohu. It's my son's first-ever trip to the island where his people are from.
Their plane was delayed by a day because of the weather, and then delayed again. But they eventually got there, and by the videos they've sent so far, it looks absolutely incredible.
So, our Matariki plans are delayed. My husband always makes Matariki soup. We tend to have it whenever we can see Te Huihui o Matariki (the cluster of stars of Matariki) or well...whenever we can...This time it will be when they return from Rēkohu.
This year's wishes on Hiwa-i-te-rangi (the wishing star) include love to those impacted by all of this rain, Palestinian liberation, an end to genocide and wars, obviously, real, tangible support for our most vulnerable communities who are struggling, health and happiness, Elon Musk and Donald Trump disappearing from our lives forever, and Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams taking turns bench-pressing me.
What are you wishing for this year?
I am very, very excited about the ONE NIGHT ONLY fundraiser on Thursday for the Aotearoa 2 Gaza mutual aid fund. IMO you should definitely come to Pōneke ❤️’s Palestine. You can get your tickets here. Here's the Facebook event.
All the funds will go to the Aotearoa 2 Gaza mutual aid fund. I set up the fund in 2024 to directly support families in Gaza. It's now a grassroots collective standing in unwavering solidarity with Palestinian families in Gaza. Through consistent, direct mutual aid, we send up to $100 at a time (usually once a week) to families who are living through unimaginable hardship under Israel’s occupation and genocide. These contributions go straight to verified recipients, without intermediaries, ensuring urgent support reaches those who need it most!
’Dr .Jehad Malaka
What I'm reading:
If you read one thing this week, I think it should be this:
Quentin Allan
Trust Winston Peters to literally always be on the wrong side of history and 40 years later to still be attacking the queer community. He's such a monstrous human.
Of course, the submissions process for the gender bill is a complete sh*t show. It seems that parents of trans kids who wrote about loving their kids and wanting to protect them had their submissions rejected on the grounds that they're 'sharing personal information'. Yet at least one submission from a psychopath outing their son and dead-naming and misgendering him was published. So it's not private to say your child is trans if you're using this process to publicly abuse them, and it's not private to say your child is cisgender, but it is private to talk about your lived experience as a family. Cool. Cool. Love that for us.
I will say, fascinating that merely sharing that your child is transgender is 'private medical information' but you can share medical information about your child's disability and how the support system doesn't work for your family... Interesting eh?
You must have some kind of soul death being the people who approve and reject these submissions. Being part of that violent and hateful machine must screw you up in the long term. I'd rather work at a cock sucking factory than do that job.
Other random things I'm reading:
Asexual, Exclusively Male, and Gay? The Minions Director Is Raising Big Questions
Fanning the flames of friendship at Matariki
Lucy Hamilton
Olivia Ladanyi
Anton Nilsson
Hazel Godfrey
Eva Corlett
What I'm watching:
I watched Jackass: Best and Last at the movies with my bestie Gem. It was such a great trip down memory lane! I don't love negative over-analysis of Jackass, but I do love positive over-analysis of Jackass. Because, ultimately, I think I'm right that Jackass is an example of positive masculinity and a portrayal of friendship for (straight) men rarely seen in media.
I particularly like this piece - Why Men Keep Inventing New Ways to Suffer - by Liz Plank, who has a great newsletter called Airplane Mode:
Women don’t meet pain in adulthood. We meet it in middle school, while boys are still playing video games. Men pay hundreds of dollars for obstacle courses to experience the kind of resilience women were forced to develop at fourteen for free. The difference isn’t that men experience more pain. It’s that men often choose their pain, while women are expected to quietly accommodate theirs.
And I agree with her that Jackass is one of the most interesting studies of masculinity ever put on film.
On the topic of whether Jackass is for straight men or not - you can't deny it's fairly beloved among my community.
Jess Thomson
I also read something that I wish I'd saved about the lone 'woman Jackass' who has an utterly pointless role in the new film. It was about how if Jackass had an all-woman cast, it would be sexualised and would become fetish material. And let me tell you, I could not get that idea out of my mind watching it. It's so very true.
I'm considering if I will see any NZFF films... I really want to see Big Girls Don’t Cry and Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma.
Thomas Giblin
I'm looking forward to watching Trying season 5 on Apple TV. It's very wholesome television.
What I'm listening to:
I have started the audiobook of Pretty Girls by Karin Slaughter, which, to be honest, I probably won't stick with because I don't like books where there's violence against women. But it was recommended to me, so I figured I may as well. The narrator is very good at accents.
Podcasts I'm loving that I recommend you put on your driving playlist are:
What To Carry What To Burn - stories of adventure and survival by the incredible Blair Braverman. I feel so inspired by this gentle, lovely podcast. It's genuinely so good.
If Books Could Kill - Really great chemistry between the hosts as they snark on popular 'airport' books (usually self-help). Kinda mean and hilarious. My absolute fave vibe.
Maintenance Phase - Two of my favourite people - Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbes - rip apart diet culture. So much fun.
The Good Sex Project - Really interesting discussions about everything we don't talk about in this country! And the host is great (and she might be speaking at this!!)
Panic World - Weird and wild analysis of the internet's weirdest parts.
What are you listening to? Watching? Reading?
Got three minutes? Give three for the trees!
If you're visiting family this weekend - why not check to see if they're enrolled to vote! And make sure you check you're enrolled to vote too!
Also, please sign this:
If you liked this post, please consider subscribing to Emily Writes Weekly. I think we're a really nice community, even if I'm a demon 'head transmaiden'* lol, and I think you'll enjoy being here.
Arohanui Emily x
*Feels like stolen valour when the TERFs call me Head Transmaiden. Literally the coolest thing I've been called and I am not cool enough for it. Though kudos for finding a better insult I was getting tired of fat cunt.
Anyway, here's a poem:
If you can give a koha to the kaupapa, every little bit helps so much.
Thank you!