Episode 18: She-Ra and the Male Gaze

If you happened to see a mid-tier 1980s cartoon superheroine get a costume update that was less objectifyingly sexy for a modern day reboot of the series in the last couple weeks and you were shocked to see a bunch of angry middle-aged men complaining about it… well then, “hello there! You must be new…

Call For Comments: She-Ra and the Male Gaze – To Sexy or Not TOO Sexy, That is the Question…

From Mav: Fun fact, this show has its origins in two places. One is geeky conversations that I have had with Wayne in the comic book shop he works in and we eventually said “we should make a show out of this.” We’ve told that story before. The other is in conversations that I had…

Episode 16: Sex in Video Games

Way back on episode 3, Mav, Katya and Abby discussed violence in video games and the conversation segued into talking about video games with sex in them. We promised to do a follow up episode exploring that. Well, Wayne is away doing cool kid stuff this week like going to bars and listening to concerts,…

Call For Comments: Sex, Gender and Video Games

From Mav: Way back on our third show, we talked about violence in video games. It was a fascinating show. Neither Wayne or I are experts, so that was the first time we called in both Katya and Abby to run the discussion. It was great. I learned a lot. Chief among the things I learned…

Episode 13: Mythic Reboots

Some stories are timeless: Homer’s Odyssey, the legends of Hercules and King Arthur, the fairy tale of Snow White. These are stories that have been repeated so often that everyone knows them. They are part of the cultural consciousness. So, if that is the case, why do we feel the need to keep repeating them?…

Call For Comments: Mythic Reboots and Adaptations

From Mav: One of my favorite comic book characters when I was a kid was The Mighty Thor. One of the reasons Thor fascinated me was because he was entrenched in mythology outside of the comics. To me, it was cool being able to read a story by Walt Simonson and then later pull out…

Episode 11: Toxic Offenders & the Dark Side of Fandom

As great as internet is for creating a safe place for people to enjoy all manner of geeky hobbies, there’s a dark side of fandom. From Gamergate to 4chan, there are some segments of geek culture that have a reputation for being toxic. A reputation hat sadly threatens to tarnish the public perception fo geek…

Episode 10: Sex, Gender & FanFic

To some the world of fan fiction is the ridiculous hobby of geeks. To others it is a massive repository of erotica and pornography. But to many, it is a safe haven for Othered communities that have been kept from the mainstream — a place where they can be given a chance to express and…

Call For Comments: Sex, Gender and Fan Fiction

From Mav: I have a fascination with fan fiction. In particular, I have a fascination with the way fan fiction has a history that complexly entangled in issues of sex and gender. I wrote about the porn and fanfic connection a bit on my personal blog a couple years back, and I even had some…

Episode 8: Academia & Viral Social Justice

Earlier this month Duke University appeared in the news amid a minor controversy where a school administrator was offended by the rap music playing in a campus coffee shop and complained resulting in the employees (an African American woman and a Caucasian man) on duty getting fired. Later in the same month an African American…