Bullets (aka micro-rants)

• There are a number of sites I've stopped reading, not because they make me angry or, god forbid, "triggered," but that their performative outrage is so predictable to the point of intellectual laziness. 
• Another big feminist site where I was a sometime member has been, in the past year or so, pared down to a handful of commenters after several dust-ups because, hey, women sometimes disagree with each other. That modern feminism is tied to victimhood isn't a valid critique anymore, or, at least, by anyone wanting to be taken seriously by feminists. I stopped linking my blog there, which has brought my blog traffic way down. (I assume. I don't really check stats these days anyway.) I miss the community, but I refuse to fall in ideological lockstep.
• One problem I have in particular, at least by my own observation, is compared to most of its commentariat, a complete lack of faith in institutions. A lot of it comes from my working-class background -- it's hard to put faith in a system that not only doesn't work for but tells you your trash -- but most of it is just me I guess. Questioning psychiatry, for example, doesn't make one "anti-science," nor does considering home birth an option. I don't know when the latter became anti-feminist, either.
• I found two short stories on my aging hard drive that I'd all but forgotten about that deserve a second look. One is an obvious Margaret Atwood rip-off (I write like confirms this, by the way), and the other is a result of my trying desperately to be a "punk rock" writing in the vein of Dennis Cooper or something where everything is fucks and cocks and drugs. Oh my. In every writing shop I've attended, there was a woman, older, born-again, offended by everything. I wrote for her. Or rather, I wrote to scare her. I haven't set foot in a classroom in ten years. I wonder who I'd be writing to scare off today?