Minnesota Nice

One of the people hard at work behind the scenes here is Kyla Wagener, AKA Bitch webmonkey.  I'm sharing this for two reasons. First because Kyla recently started her own blog. She's wicked smart. You should read it.

I also share this because in her role as webmonkey, Kyla's wrangling all the content from past issues to be posted here. Our plan is to make available all content from issues that are sold out, and selected content from issues that are still available for purchase (get them while they last!).

Please spread as far and wide as you possibly can...

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Here at Bitch, we're in search of a perfect someone to join our tiny but dedicated staff as a program director (full-time) at our office in Portland, Oregon. Someone bright, with a deep talent and love for analyzing media/pop culture from a perspective rooted in social/economic justice, who's passionate about both print publishing and newer (to us, at least) forms like online, audio, and video, someone excited about helping shape the future of the work we do at Bitch (and who recognizes Bitch's potential), someone committed to DIY/grassroots operating, who understands Bitch's role as both critiquing what's crappy and praising what's good, who's as excited about Bitch as a multimedia organization as Bitch as a magazine…

The Milwaukee Zine Fest is this weekend, Friday through Sunday, July 18-20. Workshops, films, tables of zines and other printed matter. 

It's free! 

Friday night: BBQ, baseball, kickball, and music

Saturday and Sunday: Zine fair, dialogues, and workshops, plus more music at night

Bitch (and Make/Shift!) will be represented by the wonderful Joy Zuccarello, so please visit her table and attend the discussion she's facilitating about feminism on Sunday from 1-1:45. 

Several months ago, I had the pleasure of meeting Nancy Gruver, founder of New Moon, a magazine aimed at girls ages 8 to 12. New Moon is great – they're ad free, have girl editors and writers. They have a girl blog. Oh, and they're also based in Minnesota. 

Today in my inbox was a message from Nancy sharing the news that on September 1, they'll be launching New Moon Girls web community – like the magazine, it'll be ad free, girl-driven content. In the meantime, they're trying to raise money.  

Help them out, won't you?  It's a rare thing to find media aimed at building up girls' self-esteem rather than tearing it down. 

Alcohol is a depressant, right? And alcohol use and aggression/violence are related? But isn't it possible to use alcohol as a force of good, as a relaxant, as medicine? Don't we all deserve coping mechanisms?... And who are we to judge?   

Warning: Downer alert

Isn't our new website pretty?  I'm really excited about it. Except that when I clicked on the blog page, I freaked out when I saw all of our staff/founder images, with little bits of information about us. In fact I freaked out so much that I called our web design team and begged them to take it down; it felt so exposing and self-important!  They suggested I write a blog post instead and ask some questions to y'all, so here's a stab... 

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I often think about how to build community around the work we're doing without replicating (among other things) the cult of celebrity. That's a tall order in our culture, where even in progressive and radical communities, we often see the same few talking heads saying the same things. But if we're committed to real systemic change, I believe we have to reckon with this.

motherfucker.

Why?

Where did this word come from? 

Every time I hear it, a similar jolt goes through my body. 

how much it shocks my heart to hear how often the expression "you guys" is used in everyday language, especially in social movement/radical community spaces.

I don't mean to be unsympathetic or humorless or heartless. Yes I understand how difficult it is to replace that phrase with something else. But I promise it can be done. And talking about love and revolution and radical politics and building a movement feels so much better once "you guys" is gone.

Please check it out, spread the word, and let us know what you think!  What features do you like?  What would you like to see?  Comment away...

And please support our efforts if you can – we're very excited that our site is ad free and offers content free of charge.  This publishing model only works if the folks who can support this work do.  Plus then you can see the fancy rainbow donate button in action. Exciting...