New York Times reporter Alice Hines has blessed us with “The Ultimate List of Cool Happenings -- Man-free zones, a Native gathering, a leather weekend, witch camps, a trans pageant and music and dance events.”
The full-page article in Thursday Styles, a round-up preview of various worldwide events evidently curated based on political correctness, was radically counterculture even for the Times -- a milieu so far left that events barring access based on ethnicity and sex, reviled by the paper in all other contexts, became “cool."
The first feature was on “A gathering for non-binary Native Americans”:
Distinct person, female hunter, instructed by the moon: These are terms used by people from Utah to Alaska to describe Two Spirits, a term that refers to gender non-conforming Native Americans....The Montana event is open only to native people and friends of family members they sponsor (the registration asks about tribal affiliation and interest in participating in powwow songs, crafts and drums). Whereas Westerners once effaced the Two Spirit tradition, now its misappropriation is common.
Next, and perhaps most “problematic” (to coin a phrase): “Sweden’s inaugural “man-free” music festival”:
Last summer, after a wave of sexual assaults at Swedish music festivals, the comedian Emma Knyckare’s Twitter feed was a cacophony. Some commentators blamed the attacks on refugees. Others considered alcohol the culprit.
Ms. Knyckare, 31, who jokes about breast-feeding and infant wounds in her stand-up, decided to tweet a provocation of her own: “What do you think about doing an awesome festival together where only non-men are welcome until all men learned how to behave?”
Ms. Knyckare, along with the dozens of would-be volunteers who, to her shock, emailed her in the wake of the tweet, soon specified that the festival would exclude only cisgender men, whereas everyone else would be welcome....The debate around the festival’s admission policy mirrors -- on a festival-size scale -- other discussions happening across the world in feminist and queer communities around “no cis men” spaces.
“What about transgender people who love and embrace their masculinity?” wrote one commentator about similarly delineated parties in Copenhagen. “We preach that your assigned gender doesn’t determine who one is and then use it as grounds to include people in a separatist space.”
For Ms. Knyckare, the designation is a practical one. “Transgender men also need a safe space from rape culture and sexual assault,” she said, noting that in future years, men will be welcome, regardless of their sex assigned at birth. “The idea is, for now, that you can’t know who is a rapist and who isn’t. And we won’t be looking over our shoulders.”
Perhaps the most mainstream item was “Arena rock for a queer cause on Mormonism’s home turf,” referencing the LoveLoud festival.
Next up, “A queer Asian downtown dance party.” Then, a magic gathering reported under the wonderful heading, “Hexing patriarchy in a sylvan setting”:
For gender and sexual minorities, language is often a first step toward acceptance and rights. For witches affiliated with Reclaiming, a pagan activist tradition, it’s also a type of magic....The Reclaiming tradition, named for its emphasis on resurrecting ancient spirituality, originated in the Bay Area in the 1970s among pagans with ties to feminist and anarchist communities. They spell-protested the nuclear plant at Diablo Canyon in the early 1980s and formed a coalition in the Second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights in 1987.
After “A kinky history lesson with how-tos” which noted approvingly that the host hotel the “in Dallas was ready to accommodate the crowd of masters, slaves, sirs, bois, daddys and puppies in whatever bathrooms they would like.”
From Thailand came “Transgender acceptance, the television special.” It came in for a mild chiding for being “hetero-normative.”
Next, “A cult Pittsburgh techno party hits the woods,” which strove for “expanded queer inclusivity.” Readers will be gratified to hear, “You can still get naked...”
While exclusion by sex and ethnicity is shrugged off or even celebrated on the left by the Times, the paper will not abide it coming from white male conservative bastions like golf tournaments. In the same edition, golf reporter Karen Crouse’s “Lincicome Plays Against Men. Where’s the Fuss?” celebrated Brittainy Lincicome as the sixth woman to play a PGA tour event. (Women in male golf clubs and golf courses is a big deal at the paper).
Crouse almost wistfully admitted there were no signs of dissent about Lincicome’s appearance: “So far, no men have openly questioned Lincicome’s motives or threatened to withdraw from the tournament if he was placed in her group....”
