Can kid’s art be inappropriate? It’s a loaded question, and one I’ve found to be sometimes answered with sarcasm or dismissive sentiments such as “they’re just kids.” This means they’ll draw what they see, and if grown-ups consider it to contain inappropriate depictions of body parts or scenarios considered too adult for children to understand, it’s…
Mom’N’Pop Culture: Let’s Not Talk About Sex, Like Ever
In my family I would call myself the truthsayer. I don’t hold back, and more than often I tell my kids the truth when it comes to life. If they try to run off in a parking lot, I will quickly tell them that getting hit by a car means they die. If they die,…
Mom’N’Pop Culture: Girl Scouts Are More Than Just Cookies
I missed my usual Mom’N’Pop Culture post at the beginning of the month, and I’m going to blame the cookies. Thin Mints, Samoas, Tagalongs, Dos-si-dos, and about four other varieties of cookies peddled by little girls wearing adorable, sometimes toothless smiles, and patch-covered vests, are to blame for every missed deadline over the past two months.
Women Who Shaped Me: Lessons from My Mother
I’ve only just recently, in the last few years, come to call myself a feminist. I’ve only just recently, in the past few years, come to understand what feminism actually means. Prior to that, I was very much anti-feminist, because of my limited understanding of the term. Turns out, if I’d had a better definition…
Appropriate for Kids? A Genre Roundtable
Movies are too violent today! TV is full of too much sex! Even kids shows, once innocent and sweet, are full of violent imagery and bad language! Society is crumbling into the sea! Or is it? It’s hard to make decisions about what is and isn’t appropriate for kids. Protective instincts rear up, and even…
BABIES! They’re Cute. But Which Are the Cutest? Here’s a List
Hey now, it’s spring! That means things are hatching. Chicks, rabbits, tulips, etc. And babies! Babies are born all year round (and so are comics published), but lets celebrate the sweet fresh shoots of character while cherries begin to blossom and the air begins to warm. It’s BABIES! The cutest in comics. What age is a…
Women Who Shaped Me: An Interview with my Mom and Comic Artist Cynthia Martin
When I was 14, my mother began training me to drink coffee. She would warm up a mug that was mostly milk and put a little coffee in it. Over time we adjusted the ratios until I ditched the milk entirely, and I still drink my coffee black—just like her. I love telling this story to explain…
The Working Class Substitute to the American Girl Dolls
What I love and simultaneously resent most about sites and online magazines, like Bustle, Buzzfeed, The Hairpin, and The Toast, is how they fuel my childhood nostalgia. It’s like kids born in the 1980s are retroactively trying to create online fan cultures over fandoms and cultural artifacts long past their expiration date (which is really…
Blood of the Covenant: 3 of Gaming’s Best Found Families
The found or chosen family is among my favorite tropes. I’m a firm believer in family being what you make it, and I find a special resonance with stories about people who cobble together their own familial units regardless of blood relation. Sometimes our blood families aren’t as caring or supportive as we need them…
Mom’N’Pop Culture: Gamification vs. Standardized Testing in Elementary Education
There have been some noticeable changes in my daughter’s behavior now that her third grade teachers are powering into the second half of the school year and preparing students for the state assessment exams. She’s stressed. My little person of independence asks to spend more time cuddling in the evenings before bed. She has the…
The Force Awakens Awareness: On Movie Viewing, Spoilers, and Privilege
It is no secret that Star Wars fans have been excited about StarWars: The Force Awakens (SWTFA) for months since its announcement, only getting increasingly worked up from the moment we saw Harrison Ford’s crooked smile and heard him say, “Chewie, we’re home,” to reaching a fever pitch when the film opened in the US in mid-December.
#WheresRey: Why Do We Still Need Fan Outcry to Get Hasbro to do What It Should Have Done in the First Place?
In a not so shocking sexist merchandising twist, fans learned that the latest edition of Star Wars Monopoly would not include Rey, the main character of The Force Awakens film. After the fan outcry, Hasbro announced that it would remedy this issue by including Rey in the updated version. In a statement to Entertainment Weekly…