NEST MAGAZINE

Arts & Culture

June/July 2013

Teen Tits Wild Wives Bare All ........................................ 4 Featured Artist Paul Bellini............................................... 10 Interview with Bil Antoniou............................................. 16 The Drag..........................................................................20 The Oddities & Not-ities of Art....................................... 22 Yay Happy Picnic Songs Friends....................................... 20

Insight & Experience

Prisons ............................................................................ 28 Is It Bright Where You Are?.............................................. 38

Life & Society

Young White Girls........................................................... 42 Mad Men in Bed: Cinema Cycle...................................... 44 Common Nonsense ......................................................... 48 So, you decided to hate the system................................... 50

Saliencies

The Dance........................................................................37 COWER IN FEAR, SCUMLINGS!................................ 52 Gutter-Quiz with Quizmaster Joe!.................................... 54 Horoscopes Because We’re Drunk!................................... 57 Sex with Matt Smutt........................................................58

Poetry

Room for Two..................................................................19 Birth on Facebook............................................................21 She Dances the Banda...................................................... 27 The Otherside.................................................................. 41 Art by Evee Fex-Chriszt

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Letter From Gutterbird Photo by Robert MacNeil

Dear Reader, Things are changing at NEST magazine!

We’ve decided to bring more of our collective spirit and values into the process of making this magazine. We hope this will mean a more thorough exploration of the voices we represent.

In this issue, some of those voices will include the raucous group of musicians known as Teen Tits Wild Wives; comedy writer and half-nude legend Paul Bellini; and Saturn’s penultimate article of the Oddities and Not-ities Bodily Fluids Series, covering blood. We’re really proud of the results of our new approach. We hope that you get as much out of reading it as we did producing it for you.

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The State of the Bird Words and Art by Billy Cudgel

has been happening at gutterbird and there’s always some

I tend to use this space to do one of two things, either I talk about gutterbird or I rant about something political, economic and/or ecological. Then Bunnyface usually makes a denigrating comment. While there’s a lot of really neat stuff

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political/economic/ecological mess to be upset about I feel that I’ve been bogarting this column. For this issue I want to give Bunnyface the opportunity to say his piece. To really get his message out there. To show us what he’s all about. So without further introduction I give you Bunnyface!

Goddamnit Bunnyface.

Teen Tits Wild Wives Bare All

by Hannah Robbins, Photos by David Waldman

Introduction A few months back I finally had the opportunity to invite one of my favourite local bands, Teen Tits Wild Wives, to play at one of the Gutterbird shows. It was something special. In the sweaty, beer-soaked din of an industrial loft Teen Tits exploded with a loud, full, and energetic sound. A hundred people danced to excited melodies blaring out from a brass horn; they stomped their feet along with complex rhythms. The ground-level jam aesthetic belied the sophistication of the music which changed within songs from straight tempos to something weirder and more experimental. With three guitars (Alex Low, Cam Whitesell, and Ronnie Cote), Brandon Lim on bass, and Andy Destacamento’s percussion, the sound is rounded out by Gabi Charron-Merrit’s melodic trumpeting. I firmly believe they are one of Toronto’s most fun local acts to follow.

Our interview takes place at their rehearsal and recording studio. I find it after walking down a colourful graffitied alleyway near Queen and Bathurst. The space TTWW shares with a handful of other bands has storage for all of their equipment, as well as a whole wall of VHS tapes and a shabby supposedly DVD/VHS-playing TV that eats tapes and doesn’t play DVDs. They’re starting a collection of empty Olde English bottles, and when you open the door to the room you can hear other musicians having their rehearsals down the hall. It’s a great space to connect with other bands and hang out.

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TTWW is a band with a similar spirit to gutterbird. They have moved away from playing at bars and concert venues and have started to focus on playing independent venues.

For a few years, they had a live-work style studio space called “The Academy of Sciences,”. While it was a great space for parties, it also allowed many Toronto bands and even touring groups to sidestep the need to play in commercial spaces like bars. The space could be arranged to fit the needs of every show, and its inhabitants had more control over the atmosphere and finances. While their new rehearsal space is similarly shared between that group of local acts, it is unfit for shows. That means that TTWW is now working harder to find independent venues.

Alex says, “We’ll play anywhere. But fuck bars; we play house shows. Anything that’s just not a bar where there’s just a big consumer hole of selling people really expensive drinks.”

After having thought about their favourite venues for a while Cam exclaims, “Okay I got it! Basements!” They laugh, but it’s true: not only are many house shows using basements for sound control reasons, some of the best venues are also situated underground, like the Drake Hotel Underground.

“We played a billion Elvis Mondays at the Drake,” Brandon says.

Alex adds, “He’s the man, William New.” A veteran of the Toronto music scene himself, Will has organized Elvis Mondays at the Drake since forever ago. He uses the series to showcase upcoming talent. If there were patron saints of Toronto new music, he would be one of them.

Gabi brings up another well-loved, though younger, series: “We only played there once so far, but the Feast in the East at Polyhaus was a pretty good time. It’s someone’s loft, a big space with a kitchen.”

“There were lots of interesting projections and environs.

They have bands, a guest artist that does the environment, and they’ll have somebody curate the food. The food’s always really cheap, like three bucks,” Brandon explains.

“Yeah Brandon Lim! This guy did the food a couple

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times,” Alex interrupts, nodding to Brandon, who continues

A Little History The band that is now Teen Tits Wild Wives (TTWW) started its life named Boxes & Bags. Ronnie and Jamez (the band’s former keyboardist, who retired earlier this year) met at a show, and Ronnie and Andy had been friends since childhood. Around 2006 the three started to jam together.

Ronnie explains, “one day the owner of our rehearsal space popped his head in the door saying, ‘hey do you wanna play a show in like two weeks?’ Andy looked at Jamez and I and said, ‘let’s do it!’ And we all agreed, but we didn’t have any songs. Next time we met up, all of a sudden there were eight songs to be learned.”

A few months later, bassist Bo Frantz and Gabi joined and they started to play house parties at Bo’s. Bo moved from a small second story flat to a huge live/work style space in West End industrial wasteland. That space was dubbed “The Academy of Sciences,” and it was used as the band’s rehearsal studio for a few years. The Academy also hosted many raging parties. It was a gritty, yet infinitely friendly, sort of space that seemed to perfectly match TTWW’s sound.

Cam joined after helping to write the song ‘Alabama Slamma.’

Ronnie says, “He facilitated the writing of that song, so I had been thinking for about a year, ‘yeah Cameron should join the band.’”

At the very end of 2009, the band was invited to be on the show Master Tracks. While they had been considering a name change for a while, this gave them a deadline.

Gabi notes, “We had been discussing the name change in advance of the show because we were thinking, ‘What do we want to show to the world? What do we want to associate ourselves with?’”

Teen Tits Wild Wives was chosen “because ‘Teen Tits’ or ‘Wild Wives’ weren’t enough by themselves,” Ronnie says. “We had to combine them.”

“Andy saw it on a porno,” says Gabi.

I tell them that people often do an aural double take when I mention their band by name. It’s a little shocking.

Alex replies, “I think that’s so telling about other people. I hear it as just one word, a made-up word. And there’s nothing overtly offensive about it.”

Ronnie agrees. “I think we own it pretty well. It’s suited for the songs we play and what we consider to be music.”

Brandon explains how he joined the band after the name change.

“Bo stuck around to play bass for a bit after you changed the name.

Then there was a short period of time where you guys were just doing shows with Cameron on guitar and no bassist, but it didn’t take long before you approached me. It was like we all knew it was coming, and I didn’t have to say anything. Jamez just kind of looked at me and raised his eyebrows, one of those looks. That look that says, ‘you down, bud?’

So I said, ‘of course man, let’s do this.’”

“And I basically just kept showing up to rehearsals until they let me in!” Alex says, being the most recently joined member, though already a staple.

nonplussed.

“There isn’t a lot of live music or shows in the East End of

Gabi CharronMerritt—Trumpet Other projects: “I’m

Toronto, but there are plenty of artists, musicians, and people

in a band called

who would go to shows out there.”

Orchards and I

This band is full of personality. Ronnie, Brandon and Alex are each quite outgoing during the interview, while Gabi is more withdrawn, only occasionally interjecting with tidbits of wisdom. Cam sits in the corner mumbling rude jokes and Andy doesn’t shy away from outbursts of enthusiasm. These personalities are on full display during performances, and also have led them to a unique way of writing songs.

Immediately when I ask them about the writing process, Ronnie yells, “It’s a secret!”

“Well, Gabi writes all the songs on sheet music and then plays them on her trumpet. And we follow everything that she tells us to do,” Brandon illuminates.

“She conducts us, too,” Alex adds.

“I also make videos and they all have to go home and watch them,” says Gabi.

“Yep, we watch them and study them. It works pretty well,” Alex replies.

“Andy also texts us with song ideas. He doesn’t have the internet but he texts Alex Low—Guitar Other projects: “My other thing is Hellaluya, which I do by myself and I do with other people. I put out a record last summer with Daps Records and Buzz Records. I make zines and stuff too; I have a zine called Ferrari Safari.

And I also play in the band Hut.”

do a solo acoustic thing that’s now a duo, called Ah! La Lettre! I also play hockey with lots of these folks. I make comics, and put out books through GangLion Comics. And I’m starting a music school called The Toronto Musician’s School.” us all the time,” says Brandon.

“Some people have the internet or twitter, Andy just texts us all, all the time. Or pretends he’s filming people with his phone that doesn’t have a camera in it,” Alex notes. They laugh knowingly.

I interject: “So I’m going with ‘Gabi writes everything and gives you guys videos to study, and Andy texts everyone his ideas.’”

“Yep,” Cam agrees. “ The rest of us are just puppets.”

Alex continues, “We also take a bunch of small songs we’ve written and put them together into big songs. And so songs can be a whole bunch of stuff happening in a sequential order.

We record ourselves and sample ourselves too sometimes. We have songs where we took one of the recordings, chopped it up, then played it on a sampler and learned that.” It reminds me of the cut-up technique William S. Burroughs used sometimes in writing.

Gabi adds, “We have hours and hours of jams we recorded that maybe someday we’ll listen to and learn the parts to, try to duplicate that.”

In the traditional ways a band can ‘make it,’ there are a number of barriers in terms of getting access to the industry, as well as financial barriers. One way many Toronto musicians and groups are bypassing these challenges is by producing

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their own recorded music and distributing it through either digital pathways or through outdated media that have become financially accessible. Teen Tits Wild Wives is taking the latter route by releasing some of their new music on tapes. The lowfi media is a great match for their often garage-y style, and it’s also a perfect fit in terms of their methods of songwriting.

Regarding the ‘cut-up’ method, Brandon says, “Our last tape, Chan Sounds, was basically like that.” Released last fall, Chan Sounds is named for Jackie Chan, who some of the group met when he went to Brandon’s parents’ restaurant.

“A lot of Chan Sounds was beats we made,” Alex continues, “or that some of us made on our own and then we mixed it all together here in our new rehearsal space using tapes, video cassettes, and computers.”

when we rehearse.”

“And the sequel is coming out really soon. Maybe in May. We don’t a have a title yet, but it will be a sequel to our celebrity sounds series,” says Alex.

With the new tape underway as well as shows, side projects, Ronnie Côté— Guitar Other projects: “I have this comic, called You Are Not a Wizard of This Universe. Cameron said that to Bo a long

It was a way of recording not only the songs you can hear

time ago and it was

at their shows, but also the process they are born out of. Cam

the funniest thing.

describes it as “bringing the ridiculous practice to the people.”

I’m also working on another comic with a guy from work.

Alex starts, “We really just wanted to show people—“ “How silly we are! All the time!” Cam finishes.

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Gabi agrees, “Chan Sounds is basically what happens here

He wrote the story about these funny cyborg trees and a detective. I’m pretty stoked on that. And I also play in John Milner You’re So Boss.”

Andy Destacamento aka “Bandito”— Drums

the time I was thinking, ‘playing music is the greatest shit.’

Playing music live and playing for your friends, it was the

Other projects:

greatest shit I’d ever seen and that totally made me want

“I’m in John Milner

to play music. But changing is a natural thing for anyone

You’re So Boss and

who’s going to play music for a long time. Everyone wants

Dumb Moms, I play

people to care about them in the long term, and not just see

hockey... There’s

them at a show and have a good time. You want to develop a

a bunch of shit

relationship with people so they’ll care about what you do for

going on in here.

a long time.”

Skid Mark, Crusty Panties, Greasy G, DJ Double D. I’m just a shoelace, it goes through each hole.”

In terms of the ways their songwriting has grown, Gabi explains, “The attitude towards how we write songs hasn’t changed from the get-go. Maybe the sophistication has evolved but at the same time, we still allow ourselves to write

work, and thrice weekly rehearsals, the crew keep busy

gnarly, gross songs that are incoherent.”

schedules. “It’s a stressful situation. Everyone deals with juggling various projects, and that’s probably the greatest obstacle as a musician,” Brandon notes.

“Yeah. Making money, with all the costs there are,” says Cam.

The earnestness and

Everyone wants people to care about them in the long term, and not just see them at a show and have a good time. You want to develop a relationship with people so they’ll care about what you do for a long time.”

“It’s not easy to make it

sincerity with which this band rocks is one of the best reasons to see them live. Brandon recalls a favourite memory from a show before he had joined: “Cameron and I were in the audience getting a little rowdy and the songs

all come together but we all make a concerted effort,” Andy notes.

Gabi adds, “We all did a great job of paying for our album by having shows though, so it’s going forward.”

“Exactly, we don’t rely on other people. We’re DIY about all this shit.” Alex says.

Over the years, Teen Tits Wild Wives has gone through

Brandon Lim aka “Link”—Bass Other projects: “I’m in Hussy, and I just started a two-piece project called Toronto Homicide Squad. We

a lot of changes: band members coming in and out, songs

just put out our first

getting longer and more sophisticated, and a growing fan

tape a few weeks ago

following. However, the group always maintains the punk

and the second one is

attitude we love them for.

almost done. I do a

Alex mentions how this attitude is one of the reasons he was initially inspired by the band before becoming a member: “Seeing Boxes & Bags who were starting to play music all

zine called The Healthy Ninja! It’s an urban, macro-biotic, ninja, dietary, spiritual planning guide...” He trails off, then drops a smoke bomb and disappears!

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Cam Whitesell—

once, but that show was fuckin’ hilarious. And then there

Guitar

was the time Ronnie ran around us in front with his guitar’s

Other projects:

cord so many times. We all got caught up in your cord and

“Really just drinking

fell down! There was also the time I saw Boxes & Bags at The

a lot. Sometimes I’ll

Centre of Gravity (the East End circus school and sometimes

make beats at home,

venue) and Ron threw his guitar in the air as high as it could

that’s pretty fun. I

possibly go! The ceilings were like sixty feet, so stupidly high.

used to do Oscar

And then it came right down.”

Brown. I’m also working on my sitdown comedy. It’s like stand-up, but in a chair.”

were getting crazy. Then we were pushing each other back and forth and I just got pushed into a place where there was just nothing to brace me from keeling over. I hit my head against the edge of a speaker cabinet and that night was... three staples. After I hit my head I was lying down on the floor and everyone was looking down at me, so I did a kick up off the ground! It was a perfect handspring off my back and onto my feet. I was expecting everyone to be all, ‘whoa that was so rad,’ but their jaws had all dropped because I was gushing blood out of my head. That’s when I realized it was serious. The rest of the night I had a bunch of girls all huddling around to make sure I was ok - they got me to the hospital.”

“I always like when I look over and Andy’s trying to puke on his cymbal,” Alex says. “I’ve only seen you kinda do it

“Ron was funny that night. Someone said, ‘Why’d you do it?’ And you just said, “‘Cause I knew I could get away with it,’” Cam says.

“Actually, you gave it to me to throw,” Gabi recalls. “I remember you saying ‘Just throw it straight up in the air, nothing else. Straight up, and it’ll come straight back down.’”

“And Jamez was tossing ‘coke’ out into the audience, little bags of baby powder!” says Alex.

“And Jamez is gone now. Miss that guy,” says Andy.

Brandon concurs, “I miss Jamez.”

“He’s always in our hearts...” says Cam. “He’s always part of the gang though, you know? Blood in, blood out,” notes Alex.

“Nope, he didn’t die or anything. That’s true,” says Gabi Brandon ends, “If you’re reading this, Jamez, we miss you.”

Check them out on facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/teentitswildwives

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Featured Artist Paul Bellini Get a glimpse of the man behind the towel NEST magazine sits down with writer and comedy legend Paul Bellini.

By Brock Hessel, Photos by Billy Cudgel While Paul Bellini used to parody Canadian Heritage Moments for the news satire show This Hour Has 22 Minutes, he truly deserves a heritage moment of his own. Mr. Bellini is famous for his non-speaking role on Kids in the Hall (KitH) as the plump gay guy with a brunette Rorschach pattern of hair on his chest, wearing nothing but a towel. If his fame and service to our country stopped there, you might ask, “Why Bellini? What do you see in the bilateral symmetry of his chest of bear fur?” But then looking at some of these Heritage Moments videos, I might ask back, “Why is it important that we commemorate a house of sod some settlers made on the prairies in the 19th century and not the house of sodomy from which Bellini came?” Even if the corpus of Bellini’s work consisted solely of walking around in a towel on international

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television as a gay man in the ’90s, that would have been enough for me.

But it wasn’t enough for Paul. In an interview with NEST magazine, Mr. Bellini described himself as a “real busybody as a kid” and it seems he never grew out of it. This kid is a comic, a teacher, a lyricist, a critic, a columnist, a filmmaker, and a do-it-yourselfer. He’s definitely not just some slutty gay man in a towel.

The birth of the Towel Guy came right around the time of the tenth anniversary of the 1981 Toronto gay bathhouse raids. While connections between

Thank god the Comedy Channel played KitH reruns when I was a depressed queer twelve-year-old or I don’t know where I would be.

Billy Cudgel and I had the honour of sitting down with Bellini in his home on a Monday afternoon—twelve hours later I found myself in a bathhouse. It wasn’t until I took off all my clothes

year. It is really not a progressive or fun place; other than drinking there’s almost no other activity. [...] And so for me it was like, ‘How do I get the fuck out of Timmins?’ Luckily, I was smart kid and when I was in high school I was really high reaching. […] I realized, ‘You know what? I’m gonna get a scholarship from my dad’s mining company. I’m gonna take something that you can’t take anywhere near Timmins. I’m gonna study film.’

“I went off to study film, which everyone in Timmins thought, ‘He’s fucking insane.’ And I kind of was, but it got me out of Timmins and as soon as I got out of Timmins to York University, I was in this creative community.”

these raids and Bellini have been made, the significance of this connection remains as foggy as the steam rooms in your local bathhouse.

And even though Towel Guy was really just the result of the KitH producers attempting to gauge viewership, I’d like to think that this unintentional tribute to the raids remains an important signpost in LGBTQ political history.

I know it sounds like a stretch, but think about it: in 1981 LGBT people marched the streets of Toronto in outrage over the arrests of more than 250 towelled gay and bi men. They queered downtown Toronto. In 1991, the Towel Guy didn’t just march to the door of contest winner Rebecca Klatka of St. Petersburg Florida; he marched into and queered the homes of North America. Well, at least the homes that

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had CBC, HBO, or CBS.

and looked down at my nipples protruding from two nests of unruly brown hair and the towel around my waist that I made the connection. Did my subconscious tell me that if I went to Steamworks I could become Towel Guy 2013, complete with cameras awaiting my exit and a fan club in the back alley holding signs reading “WE LOVE HESSEL”? If only it were that easy. For Bellini that’s not even close to how it started. Born in Timmins, Ontario, Bellini was more interested in “champagne and film societies” than hunting, hockey, and brewski. Growing up in a variety of oppressive small towns and cities myself, this is a man I could relate to: Well, I think everyone wants to leave Timmins. […] It’s about 40,000 people and it’s cold maybe 8 months of the

Film, because the closest thing you could come to was Toronto. […] So for me, I went off to study film, which everyone in Timmins thought, ‘He’s fucking insane.’ And I kind of was, but it got

me out of Timmins and as soon as I got out of Timmins to York University, I was in this creative community.

Bellini fondly remembers studying under Robin Wood (1931-2009), who he describes as “probably one of the best writers of film in the last century.” York is also where he met queer filmmaker Bruce LaBruce, as well as the man with whom he would develop a thirty-year collaborative career, the infamous Scott Thompson. Thompson at the time “was very Iggy Pop—always taking his shirt off and sweating and screaming.”

Thompson was “insane” and Bellini “a sedate thinker.” He says of Thompson, when first working with him on a short film, “If you said, ‘I want you to run in front of an oncoming vehicle,’ he would do it.” Neither comedy legend was ‘out’

at the time, but when they finished

remembers loving every second of their

was also the producer of KitH. Michaels

school, Bellini remembers the fear of

performances together:

had faith in the troupe even when the

Thompson trying to force him out of the closet as if Bellini himself were the one asked to run in front of oncoming traffic:

In the beginning, I was invited to their shows at the Rivoli every second Monday night and I would go and I loved it. I literally was the most frequent audience

He’s already come out and he basically

member. After about a year and a half, I

forces me out of the closet, like, ‘I know

knew every one of their skits, so when it

you’re gay, Bellini!’ [in the gayest voice

came time to do the TV show, they kind of

ever] and all this stuff. I’m not really

needed me because I actually remembered

ready to commit—I mean it’s the age of AIDS and I’m a little fat kid. I’m terrified of everything.

Remember, I’m from Timmins.

CBC did not. However, if it weren’t for Bellini’s faith in KitH, the Kids may have never been polished enough to attain the fame they did. Some of the best known and riskiest material to come out of this era, including Thompson’s famous, flaming Buddy Cole, was co-created with Bellini.

“When I did that contest with the Kids in the Hall with the towel and all that shit, a spontaneous fan club formed. […] The producers were more than amused because to them, that’s like what you would call natural phenomenon.”

Bellini remembers Thompson’s first comedy troupe, The Love Cats, performing at improv competitions down at the Harbourfront. If the audience didn’t like you or your act, they’d throw foam bricks. The bricks may or may not have been thrown at Thompson due to audience homophobia; nevertheless, Bellini remembers Scott’s stoic commitment to his art: “He got foam bricks thrown at him everrrry single week, it was almost a given.”

Thompson may have been treated as the abject comic at those competitions, but another troupe, consisting of four

their material more than they did. And I was able to type it up nicely because I had great typing and grammar skills. So that was how I got the job.

Carefully constructing Buddy’s monologues to be digestible by straight North American audiences took a lot of skill from both comedians. Bellini spoke affectionately about his forays into ’90s risqué:

I co-wrote almost everything that Scott did. All the Buddy Cole monologues, Fran, Francesca, Weston, pretty much all that stuff. I also wrote a couple of other

While I have mentioned Scott’s

things with the other guys, but primarily

stoicism and the overall bravery of the

anything with Scott. We did a thing with

troupe, I in turn must stress Bellini’s

Francesca Fiore where she is a model and

commitment and belief in KitH,

it’s a fashion show and they also have to

especially in the beginning when his

kill the generalissimo. They kill him with

work for the troupe was unpaid and

a poison dart and bring the body into

sometimes uncredited. When I asked

bathroom. There’s no way to throw the

him about what he thought of Tim and

body out the window so they have to cut

Eric, a troupe that seems to have taken

him up and flush him down the toilet.

inspiration from KitH, he stated: I admire their braveness and I admire

The whole time there’s this huge line-up forming and of course it’s an haute couture

straights guys—Mark McKinney,

the company that’s putting it out because

fashion show and she’s due to be on the

Dave Foley, Kevin McDonald, and

they have to stand behind the product.

runway. At the very last minute they

Bruce McCulloch—saw something in

Any time you see edgy comedy, you have to

realize they forgot one of the legs, so she

him. And the five together, whether

applaud whoever is broadcasting it […]

just makes it into a stole and goes out onto

gay or straight, had no problem

because they are the ones taking a risk.

the runway wearing this severed leg. The

dressing up in drag to explore new and sometimes taboo comic terrain. Bellini

This is definitely true for KitH. SNL creator and producer Lorne Michaels

headline is ‘Leg Stole Steals Show,’ which I know is one of the worst puns of all time.

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Fuckin’ love that scene. It’s probably my favourite scene we ever did. It’s called Spy Models. It’s the end of season 3. I love that one.

After the first appearance of the Towel Guy in season 2 with the ‘Touch Paul Bellini Contest’, a religious fan club erupted declaring their unceasing devotion to the silent, halfnaked man. Paul remembers his surprise and the absurdity of it all: When I did that contest with the Kids in the Hall with the towel and all that shit, a spontaneous fan club formed. […] The producers were more than amused because to them, that’s like what you would call natural phenomenon. They didn’t encourage it. They didn’t set it up. In fact, they thought they were family members and I said, ‘Oh no, my family would never do anything that nice.’

Though I praised Bellini for being a serious international queer icon and activist at the beginning of this piece, seriousness was not the intention behind the creation of the Towel Guy or even the fan club. In fact, the fan club seemed to parody fan culture itself—fandom for fandom’s sake: They used to do newsletters called the Bellini Bellow and they would actively seek contributors at television tapings and write songs of praise and poems and do drawings and it was just ridiculous. [...] Their logic was they were going to start a David Hasslehoff fan club, but at the last minute I came on TV, [and that] spun their heads around. Like ‘Fuck David Hasslehoff, this is who we have to do a fan club for.’ They ran it for a couple of years, but then it kind of petered out after the tapings ended, you know, ’96 or ’97.

The year KitH ended, the show was nominated for an Emmy for ‘outstanding achievement in writing’—with credentials like that Bellini had no problem landing his new job on This Hour Has 22 Minutes. Paul’s time in Halifax, working on 22 Minutes, later earned him another prestigious award: a Gemini for comedy writing. The new job turned out to be great fun (partly because of Halifax’s party culture and its loving communal vibe), but it made Paul’s work on KitH seem like a cruise in the park—or maybe a stroke in the tubs: Well, you know, 22 was a different thing from Kids because

14

we’d go in on a Monday and we were there

Raphael (editor from ’02–’06) strived to

especially when Bellini talked about a

every day, working. Then we’d do a show

make more explicit in the magazine. His

punk band he and Scott Thompson had

once a week with a live audience, and I

hilarious, recently published collection

formed:

loved having a live audience again. It was

of articles called The Fab Columns mark

a fun show to do; I really liked the other

a decade of writing for the magazine.

writers. Rick Mercer was just becoming a

One of my favourites from the book

star. I was also a huge CODCO fan, so to

is called “Lesbians of the Black Eagle”

be working with Mary Walsh and Cathy

where he makes fun of gay male

Jones was just incredible for me. I loved

exclusivity and disdain for women:

Halifax. I had a rock band there and it was a really small town, but everybody partied on Friday night—like, the entire city. It was great because thirteen shows [were] in production at the time, so there was more shows than people to work them so almost everybody had more than one job. So it was the opposite of Toronto where no one’s working and everyone hates each other and that bitter,

It’s always cute when little boys are in

It was punk done with a drum machine. So how effective is that? We were actually crazy enough to pay for two fulllength CDs, both of which cost ten grand to make and of course I have no musical talent whatsoever, but I loved writing lyrics. Ultimately, it came down to that.

the ‘girls—yucky!’ stage, although as gay

I just really wanted to write lyrics and

men we never quite snap out of it. I guess

nobody else was asking me to, so I did it

we know how cute it makes us look. And

myself.

for the past thirty years, we’ve done our best to create all-gay male spaces in which to socialize. So why are there women hanging out at the Black Eagle?

When I asked him if he had an ‘It Gets Better’ message for struggling artists, à la Dan Savage, or an ‘It Gets Bitter’ message à la Buddy Cole, Bellini

Bellini may have retired his towel long ago [...] but with his hands in so many projects he is still a multi-talented art slut whom I, a selfidentified slut and struggling artist, look up to

backstabbing poison. This was the complete opposite.

Everybody I knew was employed and flourishing and we’d go to this place called The Economy Shoe Repair every Friday night, which was like three bars joined together and it was a blast. I loved doing work in Halifax. There were so many jobs.

It was incredible, and then when I came back to Toronto, there were no jobs. It was horrible. I wish I stayed.

Had Bellini actually stayed in Halifax,

Another piece I love from the collection is his interview-gone-bad with Broadway star, Elaine Stritch.

Bellini told NEST, “Some people would bury something like that, but I loooove it because it shows me at my worst. But it also shows her at her worst.” Showing himself at his worst, standing behind something even if it falls on its face and then finding the humour in it all makes Bellini radical. I might be on my Bellini Fan Club soapbox, but it would be an

Toronto would have been the worse

understatement to say I find something

for it. Paul landed back in Hogtown

inspiring about his approach. It’s all in

as a writer for Fab magazine, where he

his DIY philosophy—either Bellini’s

helped maintain a level of lively wit and

wearing soot-soaked gutterbird feathers

engaged in subtle critique of Toronto’s

or we here at NEST are wrapped in

gay scene—elements that Mitchel

white, cum-soaked towels. I felt this

was stumped at first, but then he replied, “I don’t know if things get

better. I think they just move on.”

However, his message about doing it yourself, even when nobody’s asking you to, seems to be it. I had the pleasure of taking Bellini’s sketch comedy class in February of this year and his DIY philosophy helped immensely—or is all this praise just so I can get an ‘A’? (I’m still waiting for my final grade from the course.) Bellini describes himself as a suggestive teacher: “I love teaching.

Sometimes it’s hard when someone reads a piece that’s so dreadful, but that’s your job as a teacher—to help this person find a better way. The point of the class is not to write like me. I want them to write like themselves.” His

15

approach is so simple and affirming; Paul is a great teacher.

The class was made for beginners like me who have always wanted to test out the cruel world of comedy or strengthen the comedy already within themselves.

Other projects that Bellini has on the go are Monsterpiece

festivals.

The project sounds mouth-watering. Bellini may have retired his towel long ago (possibly bringing it out every once and a while to actually get laid), but with his hands in so many projects he is still a multi-talented art slut whom

(chapter one is featured in issue 10 of NEST and if you

I, a self-identified slut and struggling artist, look up to for

haven’t picked one up, you’d better!) and a more serious

liberation, inspiration, and… stimulation.

experimental film project with film editor James Greatrex.

The project sounds like a romantic return to his days as a child cineaste in Timmins where he would stay up late watching Fellini and Bergman films, not caring if the movies were in French because he was “so in love with them visually”: On Scott Thompson’s podcast, The Scott-Free Podcast, I’m always talking about how I’m making this film about rain—shooting all this black and white footage of me watching the rain and walking and driving through the rain—and Scott makes fun of me. The truth is that the footage is really beautiful, dense, mysterious and rich with all the superimpositions [c/o Greatrex]. We’re just trying to make a moody film you can almost fall asleep to. All the moody background music is from Mouth Congress, my band with Scott. When it’s done I want to enter it in various short and experimental film

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Interview with Bil Antoniou

We Are All Gutterbirds, but Some of Us Are Looking at the Stars

By Natalie Kaye Wilde Bil Antoniou is the fastest wit since Mae West. He is

Joseph’s Trouble About Mary, The Insatiate Countess, Don

a Toronto-based actor, playwright, singer, and film reviewer.

Juan Ladykiller of Seville, The Conversion of the Harlot Thais,

He has performed in a plethora of plays all across the city. I

Lust’s Dominion or The Lascivious Queen, the list goes on ad

directed him a few years ago in The Jest of Hahalaba at the

nauseum. It makes me sick. The characters in these plays use

Robert Gill Theatre in which he epitomized the dry, sarcastic,

the Ten Commandments as a To Do list. Yet these plays have

unflappable butler. Whenever I think of him, I imagine him

a reputation for being dry, academic, and didactic, with stale

in a dashing tuxedo or cobweb-coloured

text and stationary actors. This provides

velveteen smoking jacket, a sky-blue

the dirty professors with the perfect cover.

cravat of the sailor style, and a tasseled

You see a dry, mild-mannered academic

smoking cap, swirling a brandy and tut-

reading a crumbling old text in the library

tutting society.

and remain totally unaware that within

We first met in 2008 when we acted together in the Poculi Ludique Societas production of Ram Alley. PLS—The Cup and Game Society—produces plays written from 1100 through 1650.

Sounds perfectly innocuous, right?

Dusty old Latin, dusty old texts, dusty old professors; seems rather quaint, no?

No! Let me share with you a secret, previously known only in academia. It’s the seemingly innocuous old bearded professors with patchy jackets and pipes reading Chaucer you have to watch out for. That’s right, Chaucer’s dirty! Who knew? The seemingly innocuous old bearded professors with patchy jackets and pipes, that’s who! If you hear someone quote Middleton, John Marston, or (I shudder to even type the frisky bard’s name) Shakespeare, promptly run in the opposite direction! Unless, of course, you’re into the whole cuckoldry, murder most foul, and bed tricks thing.

Historical texts are scandalous. They’re dirtier than a dayold post-lasagna baking dish. I’m tellin’ ya, these plays are rife with sex and violence. Even their titles make me blush: the aforementioned Ram Alley, The Woman Taken in Adultery,

the pages lies more filth than on the cover.

Don’t judge a Professor by his cover!

But enough about disgusting old men and their Latin.

What first sparked your interest in theatre, Bil? It’s something my mom was always passionate about, so she exposed us as early as possible. My earliest memories are of going to plays with her. […] It will sound corny, but I remember really enjoying how the atmosphere would change when everyone would get quiet and pay close attention to what was happening in the centre of the energy of the room where the performance was happening. Of course, I wouldn’t have been able to articulate it that way at the time.

Why did you stick with it?

It just never occurred to me to do anything else. I always felt out of place all the time, but for some reason being alone in front of people and performing felt very natural and appropriate, plus I really loved attention and it was always fun. […] Performing on stage is when I am happiest and my brain slows down enough to just enjoy the moment and not

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think about the million other things I either should be doing

is where my cinematic influences find their way into

or wish I was doing. Every time I close a show I’m exhausted

my playwriting: Woody Allen, Preston Sturges are huge

and say I don’t want to do it again, and within hours I miss

favourites. All About Eve is one of the best examples of

it and can’t wait to move on to the next thing, so I don’t

dialogue on screen, as is Moonstruck. Yasujiro Ozu is probably

overthink it and go with my pleasure.

my favourite ever filmmaker, along with Luis Bunuel. For

Are there companies with whom you particularly enjoy working?

I actually can’t think of a theatre company that I haven’t enjoyed working with, and not because I have such low standards. I think I’ve just been very lucky, and I think there are also a lot of groups working in Toronto who are interested in putting on a good show and getting their names out there,

acting, I’ve seen Howards End more times than any other film in my life, and Emma Thompson taught me more about acting with one performance than anyone else ever has, and the film is a great example of making classic literature come alive without seeming stilted or dated.

How do you take inspiration from the cinema without producing an overly cinematic play?

so they know that running things smoothly behind the scenes

I think it has to do with the movement of the piece. As I

is a great way to make that happen. […] I work with [Poculi

said earlier, I love rich dialogue, so I take a lot of that without

Ludique Societas] at U of T a lot because I particularly love

putting in too many scene changes or short bursts of action

them, and have only ever said no whenever I was already in

that keep moving. I find that a lack of unity of action is

another show or couldn’t make it work with school. Their

usually the giveaway that a playwright watches more television

productions are always pure pleasure for me and I’m always

and film than theatre (which I do as well, but I do my best

so proud of the result (and the fact that I can memorize SO

not to let it show!).

many lines).

What are some of your theatrical influences?

Wilde’s Importance of Being Earnest is my favourite play,

What part does wit play in your writing?

I have always loved language, and wit is marvelous because it is all about finding ways of using it that capture the

and his Lady Windermere’s Fan is probably my second

imagination and present alternate possibilities to things—like

favourite play. I love the combination of calculated wit and

Dorothy Parker’s “You can lead a horticulture but you can’t

surprising depths of emotion, and the way that he viciously

make her think”. Of course you run into difficulty with it

satirizes his society while at the same time showing a deep

because the desire to be exceptionally sharp with wit can also

love for and indulgence in it. It’s probably the reason why

make you come off as mean, but that is also often because

he has lasted so long. Of course I grew up on Shakespeare

you’re revealing a truth (or something you see as a truth) that

so I have an influence that, like most people in the English

other people are not comfortable with. I hate it when stories

language, I am rarely consciously aware of. I wish I paid more

are didactic or preachy, though, so I find wit is a great way

attention to the more modern theatre writers but I don’t; my

to express a political or social opinion without boring people

habits take me more to movies than plays so that is where I

(and boring people is the worst thing you can do to your

get the most amount of inspiration.

audience, worse than being didactic or preachy).

What about cinematic influences; have any writers, actors, directors, or films had an impact on your writing (or acting) style?

Are your plays based in fantasy or reality?

It’s a combination of both, generally fantasy based on my reality. I’m often splitting myself into pieces and examining

For sure, and it’s usually the filmmakers who put an

the same issue from various viewpoints, and I’m sure any

emphasis on character behaviour and rich dialogue, which

writer will tell you the same thing. With my first play, The

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Best Men, I cut myself into four pieces and put the arguments

across a strong interpretation, and the end result is something

I often have in my head about friendship and relationships

that is extremely good for your brain.

into four different people. With my second, Operation Impervious, I took my own love of celebrity culture and my disdain for it and split those into two people, along with my ambivalent feelings about sexuality and romance. The situations that my characters find themselves in, however, are all entirely made up—it’s rare that they’re based on anything that has happened.

What are the benefits and disadvantages of performing a role you have written?

Why do dirty, dirty historical texts have such a squeaky clean reputation?

They probably have that reputation because [the sex and violence] are usually put across verbally instead of through action, and a lot of people take that to mean that things like sex and violence were only spoken on

I think we also associate sex and violence with low culture and historical plays with high culture and don’t see how the two can mix

stage and not enacted […] If you hear some of the things we talk about in PLS plays they are downright filthy, and the last show I did with them had me in a brawl with my onstage wife. I think we also associate sex and violence with low culture and

I have not had any disadvantages so far; I’ve been smart enough not to direct

historical plays with high culture and don’t see how the two

myself in a play that I have written, so I bring in people with

can mix, and a lot of people don’t realize that these things

opinions about modifying and developing my characters in

were never high culture at the time that they were originally

a way that I never would have thought of on my own. If you

written.

trust other people with your work and are not too precious about it you can have a wonderful experience, but if you think you know everything just because you wrote it yourself you’re probably sunk. At the beginning of production of The Best Men I struggled with this, but once I learned to let the writer part of me go and just be the actor, it was a very smooth experience and I got much more out of myself as an actor than I would have otherwise

Does your approach change if text is historical, rather than modern?

It changes a lot because you have to find a different way

What are your future plans? What projects are you working on now?

I look to the legendary Joan Rivers! She says that performers have to say “yes” to everything. I’m continuing to write plays because I want to learn how to get good at them and I feel that this is the best way to do this, but I also continue to perform in other people’s productions whenever I’m given the opportunity to do so. I love being in charge, but I also love letting other people be in charge so I enjoy the balance. I’m also expanding myself to other media by trying The Best Men in television format and I’ve started a

to sustain your argument and present a truth than you are

podcast, BGM: Bad Gay Movies/Bitchy Gay Men, which is an

used to doing. Generally these plays are written in long

opportunity for me and two brilliant co-hosts to give some

monologues, which people don’t speak in […] so you want to

feedback to an aspect of cinematic culture that aims to satisfy

combine a kind of arch, poetic delivery while at the same time

the needs of a marginalized viewing group while often failing

giving it emotional truth. Plus it usually rhymes, so you have

to do it well. I watch movies as a busy hobby so I continue

to pull that off in a believable way without being jokey about

to write reviews [at www.myoldaddiction.com]. Thanks Bil!

it. Every time I have done a show with PLS I have always had

Keep up the dirty work! Check out www.badgaymovies.com

a razor-smart director who always made sure I understood

and Bil’s blog at www.myoldaddiction.com

everything I was talking about, so that helps a lot in putting

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Room for Two

Poem by Dominique Bechard, Art by Adrienne Dagg

spotted by a club on a twisted eye vagrants in the earth-hole lounging incompetent and throwing dice across a carpet that is frayed like the cervix of a saturday-night whore raggedy beatrice shoots a wicked grin and I’m pinned to this feeling of society that is truly love, my mother told me once when I was a little girl with a freckle on my chin like an omen of sunshine with burns and flaccid skins. look westward and there’s the faint hint of a dream receding, but all the rest is illusion from a motel room somewhere between here and the moon’s hostility there is only space and the tinge of a disgrace that happened so long ago it resembles my dream––receding. carry me home after a night scrawl, but o no, you have other intentions, leading me down

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sulphur streets to the sounds of rectitude–– my father’s lashing tongue, my brother crying dissolution from a rope tied to the ceiling. you mean no harm you say, it’s society’s fault blaming you for the sins of the collective: sex is a loving act dear, especially now that I love you, I’ll even marry you if I have to. my mother’s voice telling me over oats that this is the only love I’ll ever know. and still it takes a life to understand that time has its own affinities that cling to custom like a sea of slimy things to the bottom of foot #2 because foot #1 is tapping an attack of anxiety-related syndromes that drone like the motors of new cars, a room for two and beer for good cheer–– slit a bloated eyelid in half from bodies that crack and sizzle like eggs in the white sheets of a grey half-light.

Order of everything idiotic and saving

castle because she was too weak and

you from nothing so that I can get

stupid to stand up to her elderly step-

laid.

mother. She’ll never stand up to me. I’m

(Pause) When was the last time someone, some guy, someone, anyone slain a dragon for you?

I’m not being metaphorical, this isn’t a metaphor, this is a question. A Matter-Of-Fact, reality-based, some kind of We’re-Drinking-Beer-AndYou’re-Annoying-Me question.

Answer the question.

The Drag

Rachel’s insightful dramatic monologue about rape culture.

By Rachel Ganz, Art by RewFoe It isn’t nice.

Since when is that nice?

He’s not being nice he’s being fucking “manly”.

Manly.

Manly: when your dick gets in the way.

Manly: I’ll save you from a burning building or a man twice my size or alcohol poisoning because I’m a man, oh, I’m a cliché, I’m following the common and basic American Social

When was the last time— Never.

That’s right.

Never. Never. Never.

Nobody, not a single guy, no knight, not any kings, or princes or any other weird version of “man” we were once promised existed; none of those things have ever slain a dragon for a girl. Okay?

It was never for a girl. Never. Because none of those girls are attractive. How attractive is it to be fucking forlorn?

going to kill that dragon and then rape her.”

Or “Oh look some girl, some probable mermaid, just washed up from out of the ocean and she doesn’t speak a fucking word, quick before she says anything at all, why don’t I just…rape her.”

Or “Oh look: some girl has been asleep for years, I’ll just wake her up with a kiss and then, before she’s fully awake and has any idea what’s going on I will….rape her.”

You think these idiot girls are waking up after years of captivity and just dying to fuck the first guy they see?

No. I doubt it.

Believe me.

But these guys. These “heroes”

It’s stupid. It isn’t what anyone wants

these…they are just. Just risking their

but. But. It presents the possibility. Of

lives because the ease of getting laid on

pussy. And your upsetting display of

the other side of that fucking dragon is

“that-stupid-girl-thing-you-do” is just as

irresistible.

manly. Yes it is.

It is.

Yes. It is.

Because a man made that up.

Man made up the “forlorn” thing.

“Oh look: some girl is trapped in a

So. So. So thank you, for walking me home, right? Or thank you for buying me a drink, right? Or the compliment or the smile or the easy way you touched my waist when you walked past me or the eye contact or your laugh, or calling me

21

adorable. But none of it is nice. It’s all just manly bullshit.

So, yeah. Go. Go say hi.

To that entire table.

Go say hello. Or wait for them to come over here or watch them looking back at you but, remember, just, that they are looking everywhere, at everyone. And you’re the only idiot that’s looking back.

Because you think they’re nice.

You’ll think he’s nice.

And maybe he is.

But all he knows about you is that you’re stupid enough to look back.

And weak enough to let him walk you home.

And vain enough to let him keep kissing you.

And drunk enough to let him upstairs.

And tired enough to let him keep going.

And then.

Just enough of a woman to let his manliness distract you from how much of a man he really is.

building open so that you could let him upstairs.

And he looked away from you when you were tired enough to let him keep going.

But you think none of that happens because when it does happen to you, and it happens to you weekly, by my measure, but when it does happen, you pin it up as some kind of romantic nicety.

Some kind of good thing.

And here I am: The dragon.

The good friend.

The one in the way.

The ugly one.

The one they all have to slay just so they can taste your pussy at three in the morning when you’re passed out from the poison you’re guzzling just so you feel pretty enough to let him say hi to you.

Let him.

Let him say hi to you.

He’s just being nice.

This is who he is:

He’s just rescuing you from prudence.

He followed you to the bar even

He’s just a hero in ripped jeans, with

when you didn’t look back.

And then followed you home when you left.

And he gave you that look like “you’re drunk and you’ll never stop me” when you tried to keep him from kissing you.

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And he held the door to your

double vision and he probably owns an acoustic guitar.

Don’t let me get in the way.

I can walk home alone.

You, on the other hand.

Birth on Facebook Poem by Brock Hessel Before I was born again, I was born in 1985 to two would have been 11 year olds— now a cismale fag and a transwoman.

(No one liked or commented on this.)

Consider my birth the second coming.

My being “Born” saved all by stoppering the deceiving break in the top blue flatline.

The one you want to beat through to find the meaning of life.

That’s what the “About” is all about.

Before I was born, you could “create an ad” for a new Adam.

Maybe tear the old one out out of all the pages.

(And create a page to develop this idea more fully.)

But after I was born, there were no careers to be had or privacy or cookies.

You were helpless, so you bookmarked the box (a lazy crucifix)— to box me into.

And I levitated, genital-less, expressionless and blue.

The Oddities & Not-ities of Art Part III: The Blood of an Artist

In the penultimate oddities article on bodily fluids Saturn C. Powers explores the weird world of blood art.

By Saturn C. Powers, Art By Drew Petursson Blood—it’s the essence of life. It is life. The cause

crucifixions of animal carcases

of every single human death is lack of oxygen to the

that would then be splashed

brain, where blood is essential. Blood cells deliver

with animal blood. The

oxygen to the body and 25% of that goes to the

extra splashing seems a little

brain. To bleed is to release something

excessive to me. If I’ve learned

from within, to drain your

anything from Mel Gibson’s

life’s essence. Without it you’re nothing. Thus, art is the blood of an artist. Understanding that concept is super easy, because we recognize all of that language is figurative. But then there are the artists who have taken this concept literally. These people decided that letting the art flow out of their veins was a neat idea, and let it flow they did, creating masterpieces with actual blood.

religious torture porn Passion of the Christ, crucifixion is a bloody mess all on its own. Whatever.

Now there are many more artists who use blood (animal and human) in their artwork as the principal medium. Let’s meet a few shall we?

In the world of fine arts, there are many who have used their blood to create paintings that end up on display in galleries and get sold for much more than a cookie and some OJ. New York-based artist Jordan

Now blood, as an art material,

Eagles uses blood so regularly in his work

goes way back to prehistoric times,

that he has been cleverly nicknamed the

with cave murals containing animal

“blood artist.” The starting price for one

blood and marrow. But it wasn’t

of his abstract works is around $4,200.

until the 1960s that there was a

A fellow New York artist, Vince

well-documented use of blood in the artistic world. This honour belongs to Austrian artist Hermann Nitsch, whose ritualistic performance art often involved staged

Castigila, has been using his own blood in his work for over a decade to “dissolve the barrier between art and artist.”

After extracting his blood, he dilutes it and paints

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over sketches to create a burgundy hue that complements his subject matter, which involves figures with twisted limbs, decaying body parts, or the just plain demonic. Then there is Sydney-based tattoo artist Dr. Rev who uses the fine-tuned skills and talents learned from years of tattoo dude-ing to create highly detailed and realistic paintings with his Aussie plasma. If you go to his website bloodpaintings.com, his dragonfly painting will blow your mind. The world of blood art is large and eclectic.

Here is where things become really wacky. Blood art is not

bloody ice sculptures. More recently, an Indian artist known only as Hussaini created a bust of J. Jayalalitha, the chief minister of the Tamil Nadu state, out of 11 litres of frozen blood that was donated by himself and 32 of his students. Why? Three reasons: she is his favourite politician; it was her 65th birthday; and he wanted to thank her for supporting his archery association and being an all-round sports fan. I would have given her a PS3 myself.

exclusive to paintings. British sculptor Marc Quinn showed

The blood thing seems a little too personal. That’s the kind

this to the world by creating a series of large bloodsicles

of thing you give your mom, not some politician. Believe it

shaped like his own face. Starting in 1991, Quinn would

or not, after thanking him, the CM asked Hussaini not to do

collect between 4 and 5 litres of his own blood over a

that again.

5-month period, freeze it, then carve out highly detailed self-portraits. He’s made a new one every 5 years or so since (1991, 1996, 2001, 2006). He is way past due for a new one, but whatever. Quinn decided to create the Self series to document his aging process, which can be clearly seen in the changing portraits. His use of blood reinforces that these crimson sculptures aren’t just portraits of the artist, they ARE the artist. In all literal senses, these pieces came from him and he made them. They are a part of him in every way. The pieces have been sold to galleries and private collectors and must be kept at 15°C to prevent them from melting and/ or altering. In contrast to his bloody portraits, Quinn is also known for sculpting strange subjects with very conventional materials. These subjects include (but aren’t limited to) sex, bones (sometimes together), babies, contortionists, orchids, and Michael Jackson. Oh, and in 2007 he sculpted a large Darth Vader head in the same style as the sphinx.

Quinn isn’t the only guy who decided to be cool and make

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In addition to your conventional body blood, there are many women who make art using their menstrual blood.

Menstrual art, dubbed menstrala by its artists, is thought to be an empowering art form that spreads awareness (in case you didn’t know that ladies bleed from their vaginas once a month), debunks stigma, and teaches women and teenage girls to embrace their cycle. For me, simply not caring that it’s going to happen and being aware that everyone knows about it makes me comfortable enough with the whole thing to confidently buy tampons and complain about my swollen uterus. But menstrual art seems to be very helpful for others. There are many livejournals, blogs, and forums where women discuss menstrala, the majority of which are written by teenagers. I’m surprised Dove hasn’t tried cashing in on this phenomenon to boost girls’ self-esteem. Many women keep journals inked in period blood, which look a lot like the Necronomicon from the original Evil Dead, but aren’t as artistic as the Quran inked in Saddam Hussein’s blood

(which does exist). Unlike the demonic

magic nature junk, people like Muholi

blood became a new hybrid mixture

grimoire, the subject matter of these

and Su have taken control of the girl

that could be called centaur blood.

journals is empowering and optimistic.

sickness and made riding the red wave

Neat! So, how did she go about doing

That, and the art came from a tampon

sexy and powerful.

this without getting blood poisoning

and not a knife. One girl started collecting her blood in a jar, calling it her moon blood.

With the help of Bitchmedia, I

Now, I’ve saved the best and strangest bloody artist for last: French

followed by a permanent case of dead?

Laval Jeantet didn’t just go about this

artist Marion Laval Jeantet. This lady

whole thing willy-nilly. She actually

took a crazy, half-baked idea (that she

worked with a series of physicians, did her research, and spent

was able to find a few interesting professional menstrala artists to look into. South African artist Zanele Muholi uses her

Blood has proven to be an allpurpose tool that truly expresses what an artist is made of.

menstrual blood in a series called I’silumo Syaluma (Period Pains). They kind of look like mahogany paper snowflakes. Muholi’s focus is on the physical pain of menstruation, but also on bringing attention to the issue of “corrective rape” in which queer women are raped to “cure” their homosexuality.

I didn’t know that this was a thing, so thank you Muholi for bringing this abomination to my attention.

Getting back to menstrala, there is also performance artist May Ling Su. Her series On My Period features graphic photos and videos of Su menstruating in various situations. Her most well-known piece is called On the Beach in which she is nude on the beach making herself a period-blood bikini of sorts. This is supposed to be a nod to the notion that women aren’t supposed to go the beach or swim on their rag (I do). While strange, her provocative website was nominated for a Feminist Porn Award in 2010. So while most amateurs make menstrala look like more moon goddess

probably came up with while fully baked) and went all the way with her work titled Que le Cheval Vive en Moi (May the Horse Live in Me). Ever think to yourself “Hey, I bet I could totally become super powered if I rolled around in some radioactive waste”? Or maybe

months preparing her body to accept the horse blood.

She had herself injected regularly with small doses of horse immunoglobulins,

which are the glycoproteins that hang out in blood and function as antibodies in immune response. Because no one had ever been crazy enough to try this shit before, the artist called it mithridatization, after Mithridates IV of Pontus who ingested small amounts of poison and developed immunity

that you could become a vampire if you got bitten by a bat? A werewolf from a wolf bite? Well, one day Marion Laval Jeantet said “I wanna be half horse, like a centaur!” then injected herself with the blood of a horse, becoming the first horse-human hybrid.

She might not have said that crap about being a centaur, but she did have pure horse plasma injected into her veins and once it integrated with her proteins, her

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(just like Wesley and iocane powder in The Princess Bride).

In February 2011, Laval Jeantet was injected with a full dose of horse plasma and... didn’t die. She didn’t get blood poisoning, nor did she go into anaphylactic shock. The full spectrum of horse bodies bypassed the artist’s own defenses, entered her blood, and bonded with her proteins creating real centaur blood. After her transfusion was complete and the doctors gave the all-clear, Laval Jeantet completed her performance piece: she got on some horse leg stilts and performed a communication ritual with a real horse, who I assume donated the blood and refused to communicate with the crazy human female. The crazy human female then had some of her centaur blood extracted and freeze dried to be preserved and possibly studied for future hybrid experiments.

Harpies, unicorns, sphinxes—a faun maybe... We could bring Narnia into existence!

Marion Laval Jeantet said that she could feel the effects of the horse blood on her body for weeks after the injection and recalls the experience: “I had the feeling of being extrahuman. I was not in my usual body. I was hyper-powerful, hyper-sensitive, hyper-nervous, and very diffident. The emotionalism of an herbivore. I could not sleep. I probably felt a bit like a horse.” No shit! Who would have thought having hybrid blood as a result of an experimental procedure could do so much to one’s body. The long-term effects of such a radical and new experiment cannot be calculated. Two years later, Marion Laval Jeantet appears to be doing pretty okay.

I hope her next artistic endeavour will involve making some mermaids.

Blood art is strange, beautiful, and weird. While many people find it gross, it’s not like the artists want you to go lick it and get their hepatitis and/or HIV. You’re not even supposed to touch fine art. Blood as an artistic medium is definitely unconventional and totally has a gross-out factor.

But you’re not supposed to look at blood as just blood. You’re supposed to see it as life and a representation of the artist.

Whether coming straight from the veins or from the monthly cycle, blood has proven to be an all-purpose tool that truly expresses what an artist is made of.

26

Yay Happy Picnic Songs Friends Forever It’s summer and you need new tunes. Let Joel Brown show you what should be on your iPod in the coming months.

I can do.

and disappointing life experiences you

everything that this song talks about:

By Joel Brown,

can never take back, but this album

sangrias in the park, watch the sun go

when played on a back patio in the

down, become completely codependent

dwindling hours of the afternoon is

on a woman who begins to find me

really just sublime.

totally irritating. Mostly sangrias in the

Art by Emily Dalton Thank Christ summer is here. I was just about ready to load up the ol’ trusty service revolver and play

Rod Stewart – “Maggie May”: If you don’t like Rod Stewart, you are a fullblown idiot who should be slapped in the face with a glove made of children’s tears and then have a ball-peen hammer taken to your emotions. Granted, some of his later albums are complete failures

Jackson 5 – “I Want You Back”:

to yell repeatedly at a juke box, an inanimate object, the following: “HEY PLAY SEABIRD…C’MON YOU IDIOT…WHAT AM I PAYING YOU FOR? WHAT IS THIS RUBBISH? PLAY IT, C’MON, STOP WELCHING OUT ON THE DEAL.” Lou Reed – “Perfect Day”: I’ve done

park though.

Weezer – “Holiday”: This was really

Russian roulette with my plush Hunter

One time in Montreal in June, I met

S. Thompson doll. I am sitting on my

this beautiful girl in the middle of the

hard because the whole blue album

roof as I write this, staring out at the

street on St. Henri. A band on tour had

could be considered a fun picnic album.

jagged crew cut of condos dotting the

parked their van, opened their doors,

Just this Sunday past, I was roused into

skyline, and I am writing some story

turned up the volume and put on “I

consciousness/the cruel embrace of a

about my failures as a lover. I have a

Want You Back.” We danced for two

scathing hangover by my roommates

nice big bottle of San Pellegrino and a

hours and at the end of it she gave me

making a pancake breakfast and singing

sleeve of Premium Plus salted crackers,

her number and told me I was a terrible

along to Weezer. I sang along to

and I’m soaking in the sun and turning

dancer, and then a week later I moved

“Holiday” and then proceeded to puke

into a filthy yuppie. Despite the fact

to Paris and became an alcoholic. I

into the toilet.

that I want to punch everybody and

think she lives in New York and is

everything in the face and rub coarse

engaged now. Possibly expecting

sand in their eyes for listening to that

children.

godawful song “Somebody That I Used to Know” by those idiots who deserve to be placed into a blender with hydrochloric acid, I have managed to quell my rage and pick out a couple of wonderful summer picnic songs for you fine readers of this fabled narrative of cultural insight. My therapist has been telling me to stop using such violent imagery in my writing and reflect on the happy things in life. This is the best

The Alessi Brothers – “Seabird”: This song makes me want to hold hands with everyone and prance through the meadows while wearing a dashiki.

I’ve been known, under inebriated circumstances,

27

She Dances the Banda Poem by Lizzie Violet, Art by Emily Dalton Snakes dance from an urn painted with symbols of your love Blackened roses, skulls and dancing skeletons No magic used to win her heart, no spells from the dark school of voodoo You didn’t need powders or potions to capture her eternal fire When your eyes met, you danced naked together under a bleeding moon Top hat, black tuxedo, your slickest funeral wear Haitian style A man dressed to impress his lady love In a place where impressions of your skull like face are shadows on a darkened wall Imitating your hypnotic dance of lust and chaotic romance Your soul eating in the passions of a woman giving hers without question Once Twice Thrice As the black moon dances to the swaying beats Drums pounding to the rhythm of Maman Brigitte’s gyrating hips Entrancing those who are weak and empowering those who speak Voodoo and black magic echoing off the trees and walls of the mud shacks Hands clasped, bodies grasping, as your fired skin binds with each other When Baron Samedi calls your name you do not reject Magnetic words, ceremoniously direct those who preach to the undead Raising up, they cannot resist, will not turn back, marching a death march Each after the other down a wedding aisle honouring the king and queen Their love story told near the fire as they drank down the hot pepper infused libation Once Twice Thrice Rum and Cigar thick in the air as they dance the last dance of love A new world careless and inviting as they open the doors Spirits released to a world unready to be awakened Humans filled with a possession to possess things unowned Trance like they follow the King and the Queen Baron Samedi sings, his voice an instrument of Maman Brigitte’s lyrics while sipping Piman She dances the wild, erotic Banda, keeping rhythm as he taps his cane to phantom drum beats On the day that the living and the dead come together on a cold November night We will dress in purple to honour a love as pure as the flames of a funeral pyre

28A love that is bound once, twice, thrice with a red ribbon dipped in blood

Canada’s Prisons: Institutional Collapse

NEST magazine exposes Canada’s correctional system as a dangerous powder keg and points to the politicians who are looking to light the fuse.

By Billy Cudgel, Art by Adrienne Dagg Being a writer has certain privileges. One of them is that

thanks to this privilege that I could enjoy a few beers at a

it is socially acceptable for me to engage in self-destructive

bar downtown with some friends a while back, all of whom

behaviour. My chosen profession is not the only one blessed

were social workers. We laughed loudly and drank well. But

with this privilege—I share it with nurses, correctional

this would not be a long gathering; it was a Friday night and

officers, social workers, and kindergarten teachers. Although

people had places to be. This bar was but a first stop on a

the word “writer” does have a certain ignominious association,

long neon road. It was only 10 p.m., but two of us remained:

I am nonetheless able to share the social habits of those in

myself and my friend Nicole.

the more noble aforementioned professions. It was largely

29

My friend Nicole Nicole is a strong woman. While she was educated in

so they buy him off with a pack of cigarettes…”

This was starting to sound a lot like a game of Mandingo.

political science, she’s worked her whole adult life in social

When I asked Nicole if I was understanding the situation

services. Nicole carries herself with a revolutionary’s assurance

correctly she made it clear that I was. Lucky was a modern

and she possesses an energetic, probing intelligence that

gladiator.

flashes behind dark eyes. For years she served the adult male population of Canada’s prisons and it was on the subject of prisons that we began to speak. The raw force of her passion and the coherence of her ideas prompted me to surreptitiously place my recorder on the beer-soaked table in front of us and

“In Lucky’s case he would go out into the yard and this guy would beat him to a pulp. And the guards would watch.”

What. The. Fuck.

“The thing that Lucky said to me was, ‘At least it was better

ask “Do you mind if I record this? I might write an article

when they didn’t have me in handcuffs and shackles.’ So not

about it.” She assented.

only is the man having his ass violently kicked by somebody

“I had a client who was nicknamed Lucky. He was in segregation in Kingston Pen.” Okay, I didn’t know what “segregation” meant but I was way too intimidated to ask, so I looked it up later.

Apparently segregation is

who is significantly bigger than him who is being provided an incentive—cigarettes—to kick his ass, but just to make the

“I’m going to process you through this thing that’s going to disconnect you from all of your support and anything that’s going to keep you sane or stable. I’m going to lock you up with people who hate you, who abuse you: the staff. Then I’m going to lock you up with the people who want to victimize you: your housemates, your roommates if you will. And then I’m going to spit you out with nothing.”

beating more brutal they handcuffed him, and in one case […] shackled him too, so he couldn’t protect his face.”

And that wasn’t the worst of it.

“I had a client

solitary confinement ‘light’. If an inmate is in segregation s/

who was chained down in the bowels of KP, the place they

he is isolated from the general population, but s/he is still

never talk about, […] chained down naked in a four-point

entitled to the rights and privileges afforded other inmates.

for a couple of days (not sure how many), food by the side of

“Within the segregation system, what was supposed to be happening is people would take yard time alone—it’s the smallest space, you can’t even call it a yard—which happened, unless the guards wanted some degree of amusement or hated you for some reason.”

Wait… What?

“Essentially what was happening was fights were created for the amusement of the guards. And if you put yourself in their situation they’re… Well, they’re bored. What would happen is that they would pick the biggest, most dangerous, least thinking person who also happens to be addicted to nicotine,

30

his face on what seemed like a dirt floor (too dark to know), eating like a dog, urinating and defecating on himself. Is that going to make a good neighbour? If you think of the experience and how that shit fries your brain… You’re making the person more damaged, and then expecting them to function better.”

Nicole’s eyes flash as she takes a long drink from her pint class. “These people are in a pressure cooker.”

All of this came as a surprise to me. While I never thought that prison was supposed to be a fun way to pass a few years, I did believe that our correctional system was built with

the intention of rehabilitation. “We do sell rehabilitation,”

the province. They call it a ‘wildcat strike,’ and it’s picking up

Nicole responds, “but the things that were the pillars of

steam. More and more COs from across Alberta are joining

rehabilitation, the things that were good about the system

the action and we’re starting to see other public safety officers

keep being destroyed. […] What little that was good about

join in solidarity.

prisons is going, going, gone. Being eroded and cut back.”

Nicole cites specific examples of cuts to rehabilitative programs including a job training program at an abattoir where inmates were taught skills that might lead to employment upon their return to society. These are important programs that are essential to the functionality of our correctional system.

“We’re not executing people. Let’s not fuck them up, drive them out, beat them down and then be like, ‘Why can’t you be a good neighbour?’ These people are our neighbours. They are in our community; they return to our community.”

I was taken aback by Nicole’s stories. If inmates are facing abuse, it seems obvious that rather than ending cycles of violence and crime, these cycles are being perpetuated. Surely these are extreme examples; non-representative exceptions

Clarke McChesney of the union representing Alberta’s COs has spoken about the reasons for the strike: “Senior management refuses to address system-wide problems like overcrowding and staff shortages.”

McChesney also drew attention to the fact that triplebunking of inmates at the Calgary Remand Centre happens on a regular basis and that, obviously, these sorts of crowded conditions are dangerous for both inmates and staff.

Pierre Mallette, the head of the federal correctional officers union has stated that: “The three major topics that people are talking to me about is [sic] overcrowding, double-bunking and population management.”

It’s not just Alberta. Referring to similar safety concerns,

to the reality of prison life. I decided to try to get some

Ontario COs at the Hamilton-Wentowrth Detention Centre

perspective from the correctional officers in our prison system.

had a wildcat strike of their own. The facility has a capacity of

And that’s when I read a Canadian news source for the first time in a month.

220 inmates. It currently houses over 600 prisoners.

Okay, so, Canadian correctional officers are concerned about their personal safety. Apparently, two or even three people are assigned to cells that are only designed for one.

This situation is understandably seen by COs as bad for both prisoners and themselves. These are legitmate issues—if something doesn’t change, surely we’ll see a marked increase in the level of violence in Canadian prisons.

In fact, we already have. Use of physical force and pepper spray by COs has increased. Instances of prisoner-on-prisoner violence have also spiked. Reports of violent encounters within prisons have increased by almost 50% since 2008.

The Strikes Did you know Alberta’s correctional officers are on strike?

For months, Alberta’s COs have been striking, maintaining their protest even after their action was declared illegal by

Gang memebership in prisons has jumped 32% in the last five years.

So what’s our tough-on-crime government doing about all this?

Responding to the correctional officers strike, public safety

31

minister Vic Toewes went on the attack: “The big union bosses seem to prefer political stunts over practical dialogue.”

Oh dear.

After exploring the COs’ concerns, I found myself thinking that the situation in our prisons was going to become a lot worse. Nicole’s stories didn’t feel like exceptions anymore; they were starting to look like harbingers of a new normal.

this practice, double-bunking, as “entirely appropriate.”

Until recently, Canadian corrections officials allowed only a few cases of double-bunking in extraordinary circumstances.

For years the Correctional Services of Canada’s (CSC) policy on double-bunking was that “single occupancy accommodation is the most desirable and correctionally appropriate method of housing offenders.” In an internal study the CSC wrote that they “recognize that there are risks associated with the use of double-bunking: placing two inmates in one cell decreases privacy and dignity which may contribute to increased tensions, decreases personal safety and institutional security, and provides less effective movement and control.” In spite of these reservations, double-bunking has become commonplace. This year the CSC had to rewrite its policy on double-bunking: “When single occupancy is not possible shared accommodation will be utilized.”

Right now there are 13,000 people in Canada’s prisons.

1,200 of them are double-bunked. In Ontario, 23% of prisoners are double-bunked. This number is over 30% in the

Politics and Policy Wait a minute—double and triple bunking? Why is our federal prison system so overcrowded?! The Conservatives have been investing in correctional infrastructure, right? I mean, I was pretty unhappy about the megaprisons when they were first proposed, but it’s a better solution than transforming our existing prisons into powder kegs.

“Well, we disagree with that assessment,” says Candice Hoeppner, secretary to public safety minister Vic Toewes.

“We have been accused by the opposition for the last two years of building new prisons and we have said that we will not be building new prisons.”

WHAT? “We’re adding capacity.”

Toewes outlined exactly what “adding capacity” means: the

Prairies. It’s a serious problem; in the two years preceding Bill C-10 (the omnibus crime bill), 1,000 new prisoners entered the correctional system. That’s enough people to fill three or four of our existing institutions.

And it gets worse.

Within the next year 300 million dollars will be cut from Canada’s prison system. In that same period three correctional facilities will be closing: the Leclerc Institution medium security prison, the Kingston Pennitentiary and the Kingston Regional Treatment Center. Over 1,000 prisoners will have to be rehoused.

Commenting on this situation, Jason Godin, a representative from the Canadian Correctional Officers Union said that “we don’t have enough beds to manage the transition from Kingston Pen into the new units.”

If we can’t handle the prison population we have right now,

renovation of old facilities and the addition 2,500 new beds.

what’s going to happen when the C-10 kicks in and more

Many of those beds will be added to what were previously

people get imprisoned with harsher sentences? More double-

single-occupant cells. The public safety minister has described

bunking and service cuts are “inevitable,” says liberal MP

32

John Mackay. NDP public safety critic Jack Harris said, “Bill C-10 just became law […] we don’t know what the effect is going to be. We do know that the cost of corrections services has gone up 20% last year alone—475 million dollars last year to pay for two of the previous crime bills.”

Cutting funding to an increasingly costly system won’t just

familiar...

In 1971 the Kingston Penitentiary erupted into violent riots. Chaos ensued, guards were kidnapped and held hostage, two inmates were murdered, and the facility fell into the hands of the prisoners. When the government regained control of the prison, inmates in the overcrowded facility were

affect population management; Vic Toewes has announced

transferred to the brand new Milhaven prison. Along with the

cuts to basic services in prison including paid job-training

prisoners came some of the COs from Kingston. When the

programs, spiritual (Chaplain) services and mental health

inmates arrived at their new prison they were savagely beaten

programs. Toewes also raised the rent for Canada’s prisoners

by the correctional officers. These two incidents resulted in

by increasing charges for phone use and in-house goods (like

the creation of an office called the Correctional Investigator.

decent toilet paper).

The Harper administration is turning our prisons into a

In the words of Howard Sapers, the current Correctional Investigator, “One of the primary causes of the unrest at

punishing, violent environment. For prisoners the possibility

Kingston was the lack of access to rehabilitation programs and

of reintegration into mainstream society is becoming a fainter

treatment.”

and fainter prospect. Something about this situation is all too

33

Howard Sapers, The Correctional Investigator “You’re sent to prison as punishment, not for punishment.”

Sapers understands the prison as an organ within the social body. He argues that “the purpose of prison is to make you better, to make you better in society; it’s so when you’re released you can be released safely.” To fulfill that purpose “you can’t have the conditions too austere or too punishing inside or you’re going to defeat your own purpose.” Sapers believes that we need to have a prison system that serves a positive social purpose—our correctional system should correct, not reinforce, antisocial behaviour. The obstacles preventing the creation of such a system in Canada are legion, but they all stem from the same basic problem: money.

The federal system is “under-resourced” says Sapers, and not just in terms of bed space and services either.

“There’s inappropriate infrastructure. […] Some of the conditions are almost third world; we’re retrofitting a prison in western Canada to have indoor plumbing[!]”

Like the correctional officers and opposition politicians, Sapers is deeply concerned about rising rates of doublebunking. “Putting two inmates in a single cell,” he says, “means an inevitable loss of privacy and dignity, and increases the potential for tension and violence.” His position is diametrically

34

opposed to that of Vic Toewes. For Sapers, double-bunking is “a practice that’s contrary to staff and inmate safety.” And the proof is right in front of our eyes: “We’re seeing an increase in the use of force, an increase in assaults, an increase in sick leave and stress leave among staff, we’re seeing an increase in lockdowns and exceptional searches.”

The Correctional Investigator’s analysis of the rising levels of violence in our prisons reinforced my concerns about our correctional system, but counting up instances of assault, rape and CO malfeasance isn’t the only way to measure the system’s success. The physical and mental health of inmates is another very important barometer.

The Regional Treatment Facility is a prison designed to house mentally ill inmates. Next year it will be closed

“How did we get here? How did prisons become the new asylums? Well, one analysis suggests it started in the mid-’60s with the deinstitutionalization movement, the closure of significant mental health infrastructure across this country. The community supports that were promised with the closures of those large-scale mental health facilities never materialized. Many of the folks who were at one point in their lives hospitalized now found themselves on the street. They became entangled with the criminal justice system—conflict with the law or their families. We criminalized mental illness behaviours.

I’ve heard too many stories of a person in an acute phase of their illness, perhaps a schizophrenic, knowing that they’re in trouble, knowing that they need help, presenting themselves to an emergency room, being very inappropriate in how they are demanding assistance and because we have zero tolerance for that sort of behaviour in our hospitals, now the police being called, and somebody who is really calling for help is being arrested instead. End up in court. And end up in jail.”

- Correctional Investigator Howard Sapers

down. The prisoners will have to be either double-bunked in another special facility or moved into the general population of prisoners. Canada’s prisons are increasingly used as warehouses for the mentally ill. Says Sapers, “Stressed staff are being asked to do, frankly, nearly the impossible and are being challenged to do work that they didn’t sign up for. As Canadian penitentiaries house an ever-increasing psychiatric population, the risk is that we’re going to rely on prisons to be psychiatric hospitals and correctional officers as psychiatric nurses.”

The famous Ashley Smith case brought the issue of inadequate support for mental illness in prisons to the forefront of Canada’s consciousness, but little has been done to change the systems that resulted in the 19-year-old’s suicide. “Ashley Smith was transferred or moved 17 times over an 11-and-a-half month period. Entering a federal penitentiary at 18, died at 19. […] Her health status was frequently not a factor in the decision to move her. The manifest reason for moving Ashley so many times was to give the staff a break because of her challenging behaviour.”

Michelle Coombs, E.D. The Elizabeth Fry Society Michelle Coombs is the director of the Elizabeth Fry Society, a prisoners’ advocacy group focused on female inmates. She talked to NEST magazine about the Ashley Smith case: “If there is one thing that Ashley Smith’s story has taught us it’s that prisons are no place for healing. Women with mental health issues don’t cope well in prison conditions, which can result in institutional charges, which, in turn, prolongs their institutionalization.” The mental health issues that plagued Ashley Smith disproportionately affect women.

Indeed, “71% of women in maximum security prisons have attempted to commit suicide compared to only 21% of men.”

Coombs believes that Ashley’s story is just one example of a deteriorating situation: “The number of imprisoned women with mental health issues [is] on the rise.” At a time when prisons are taking on more and more of the responsibility for handling mental illness, prisons have become less and less able to properly respond. There have been cuts to many important programs for women. But the entire concept of using prisons

Ashley’s suicide was a direct result our collective failure to

as warehouses for the mentally ill is flawed. Coombs insists,

recognize and support the most vulnerable in our society. Her

“Prisons are no place for people with mental health issues to

death is our shame.

recover. […] Facilities can’t and shouldn’t be the centres for mental health treatment.”

Our prisons aren’t just poorly equipped to respond to mental illness, they’re also unable to properly respond to the needs of women inmates. “Policy designed for men is not responsive to women. For instance, women generally pose a lower risk and are significantly less likely to reoffend, yet the same risk assessment tools are used for men and women.

This results in women disproportionately being classified higher risk than merited. High-risk offenders have less access than low-risk offenders to supports that would allow them to develop skills to aid with reintegration post-release.” It’s particularly difficult for Aboriginal women who are “the highest represented group of imprisoned women and the group that is growing the fastest.” They “are even more likely to be classified as high risk than any other group of women.

Almost 50% of Aboriginal federally sentenced women are

35

[…] classified as maximum-security prisoners. This limits their access to culturally appropriate rehabilitation and other supports.”

My friend Nicole...

The evening I spent with my friend Nicole went very late.

She shared her insights on our system freely: “You can’t even call it a failed system—the

This situation is untenable; our prisons have become destructive, inhuman places that will actually make our country a more dangerous place.

“A law-and-order agenda will continue to grow prison populations (as happened in the States), creating a generation of criminalized people who come out of prison without the skills and the ability to get a job (due to changes in the pardons process). It is easy to see that this is no solution to a safe and healthy Canada.”

36

“We know prison is costly, does not rehabilitate people and, in fact, people come out ‘worse’ than they went in. By ‘worse’ I mean that they have lost many of the supports they had before going in: they lose housing, employment, and for women, their children. They lose hope. So any legislation that effectively punishes people with mandatory minimum sentences and longer prison times has no positive effect on the individual or on the community. They have not proven— anywhere, as far as I know—to make communities safer.”

- Michelle Coombs, E.D., the Elizabeth Fry Society

degree of the abuse, the consistency of the abuse— […] when you’re gleefully and willfully torturing people, [… prisons become] PTSD factories.” Without access to services and proper infrastructure, our correctional system is not creating a healthier society but rather “perpetuating and maintaining a permanent underclass.”

Why have we created this situation? Is it because of some confused vision of ‘victims rights’? Is it because we want to see people who

engage in antisocial behavior punished? We have to ask ourselves: What is the goal here? “If the goal is ‘I don’t want my neighbour to be a psycho,’ then flogging them, shaming them, starving them is not going to help them.” Nicole’s argument was sensible, level-headed and non-political: “Dude’s going to be your neighbour, do you want him […] living in a pressure cooker of violent hostility?”

For Nicole, “You don’t have to care because you care, you don’t have to be a nice person, you don’t even have to be a feeling person. You need to be a self-interested person.

Dude’s going to be sitting behind you on the bus, at the grocery store, crossing the street with your vulnerable little girl. Why are you fucking him up even more, compromising his ability to cope, creating desperation so he’s more likely to victimize you? I consider spending the money and doing things properly buying myself a little insurance. If buddy is not angry and insane, I’m safer. Sounds like a good deal.

We spend a lot of money on things that are significantly less important than the sanity of our fellow citizens.”

Conservatives seem to see prisons as warehouses for criminals and the mentally ill. They’ve been working to dismantle everything about our correctional system that’s designed to help people reintegrate into society. It’s a shift in policy that will have serious ramifications.

We can expect rising rates of gang involvement, disease transmission, suicides and CO-on-prisoner and prisoner-onprisoner violence. We can expect more human rights abuses.

We can expect rising crime rates. We can expect riots.

Canada deserves better.

It is reasonable to expect our politicians to understand the intricacies of public safety and to create policy accordingly.

We can rightfully expect to live in a society that differentiates between mental illness and crime. We can demand a correctional system that works to confront and correct antisocial behaviour.

37

The Dance

By Cody Ovans Sally says “Dance.” I cringe a little and wipe the blood from under my nose. I slowly crane my neck up. It’s stiff, and a sharp pain accompanies the movement. It starts at the base of my skull and shoots across my shoulders. I›m down on my hands and knees.

Sally is standing on the top of the bookshelf, her nose obscured by a plastic beak held on by means of a white elastic wrapped around her head. She kicks me in my now exposed face and I roll over, attempting to absorb the blow, nearly knocking the bear skin I have draped around myself clear off. That would›ve been a fatal error. Feathers rain down from above, shaken loose by Sally›s swift movements. «Fucking dance!» she screams. «I can›t!» I whimper.

I hear the sharp sound of breaking glass shatter just inches from my head and feel the shards pelt me across my entire right hand side. I finally muster enough strength to pick myself up onto my feet, making sure to keep a safe distance from the range of Sally›s flailing foot. The vase I’d given Sally for her birthday, the one that had once rested next to her atop the shelf, had become a thousand shining teeth scattered across the floor.

The head of the bear skin slips over my eyes and I quickly readjust it. I now stand facing her, attempting to shield my face from whatever other projectiles she has at her disposal. She screams at me again, and I cower.

I look down quickly to asses any damage. My bare front is completely exposed, save a pair of pink lace panties that leave little to the imagination. Blood runs down my neck and onto my chest from an unidentifiable source. «Fucking DANCE!» Another object barely misses my head. Judging by the crash, I guess it was the large paperweight that used to stand beside the vase.

Suddenly the doorbell rings. We must›ve lost track of time. Sally now perches atop the bookshelf perfectly still, wings spread, standing on one foot with her other dangling limply in front of her. She curls her little toes so that she can use her largest to point toward the $40 on the kitchen table. I nod and limp toward the cash as what feels like a hundred slivers of vase slip into my feet. I yell through the pain, «One minute!» and start back toward the door. Bloody footprints mark my steps.

Sally remains in her pose, perfectly still, majestic in the soft light of the apartment. I open the door just enough to slip out the money and grab a large paper bag in return. The delivery man catches a glimpse of my face and exclaims, «Oh my god, are you ok?! I’ll call an ambulance!” He reaches for his cellphone. I must be bleeding worse than I thought; a quick glimpse in the hallway mirror confirms this. «It›s ok,» I console him as I cough up a little blood, “we do this every Friday.»

38

Is It Bright Where You Are? Lea Lawrynowicz shines a light on her past and shows us god and death through a child’s eyes.

By Lea Lawrynowicz, Art by Hilary Killam My real full name is Lea Miles Lawrynowicz. The name

carnage. It’s been mangled, mutilated, butchered beyond any

“Lea” is a portmanteau of the names Princess Leia (no joke)

recognition. I’ve seen it ripped apart before my very eyes and

and Lee, who was my mother’s best friend and cousin, who

then reassembled to form the most monstrous of creatures.

died tragically at the age of 19 from cancer.

The most violent offenders of these heinous name crimes are

My middle name comes from Miles Davis, the late jazz trumpeter. Woody Allen also has a penchant for bestowing

substitute teachers, telephone salespeople, jerks, and Nazis.

The only saving grace of my name is that it doesn’t rhyme

his daughters with the names of male jazz greats. (That’s

or sound like any intimate part of the human anatomy, so I

irrelevant; I just felt like name-dropping a famous guy I’ve

was spared any bullying of that ilk. I can’t say the same for my

never met.)

unfortunate second-grade fellow classmate, Corey Bonecock.

Then there is the last name. Lawrynowicz. Pronounced LA-

I’ve been advised many times as a performer to trade in

run-oh-wits. It’s long and complicated-looking. I know this

my last name for a stage name that would be more palatable

because people have been telling me so pretty much since the

to audiences. I know some people (usually movie stars from

day I was born. If my memory stretched further, I’m sure I

old Hollywood) regularly engaged in this practice, to much

would recall people telling my mom that her baby was going

success. Cary Grant, Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, and Joan

to have a fucking long last name whilst I was in the womb.

Crawford were just a few luminaries of the Golden Age to

The first word I ever learned to spell was my last name.

My mom made sure I knew it, in case I ever got lost—then I could just spell it out and whatever grown-up I encountered

ditch their common or clunky-sounding given names for a moniker more glamorous and snazzy.

However, I think stage names in general kinda suck. The

could go find the parents of the little girl with the long-ass last

Golden era is long dead and buried, and now performers

name.

typically morph their foreign first or last (or sometimes both)

Unless, of course, the person I encountered was a registered sex offender.

Anyways, I’ve been dragging this name around my whole life, and in that time I’ve seen it get submitted to unbelievable

names into words that sound all too much like made-up names. At best they fall somewhere between porn-like and bland in a witness protection kinda way. Fuck it. I’m not buying this idea that if I change my name then somehow more people will be interested in my performing career. I

39

don’t dig the notion that foreign-sounding names are ugly.

passed makes no difference though; it still stings my heart

This is the melting pot of the world for chrissakes; we can’t all

to think of him gone. Some things aren’t meant to be gotten

have names like “Taylor” or “Smith.”

over. Some incidents don’t just pass through you and end up

I think oftentimes performers get too caught up in this idea that you need to change yourself, to modify and dilute who you are, to get work or be successful. In doing this, they actually become way less memorable. I have no issue with improving or maintaining your craft, but I’m always wary

becoming the past. Some things get lodged or stuck inside you like invisible shrapnel, and then you must carry them through the rest of your days like the wounds of your own personal war.

There was no place for God in our house. My parents hated

of ripping out the fundamentals of one’s self in a bid to be

religion and all its trappings. Imagine their surprise, then,

noticed.

when as a little girl I voluntarily embraced Christianity. I’m

Another reason I’m intent on keeping my name is because it belongs to him.

Him. My father. My daddy, my papa, my old man, my one and only. The most important and influential figure in my whole life is a ghost, and has been for 16 years. The time

40

not sure how this happened, since I wasn’t exposed to religion.

Perhaps I saw it as an elaborate fairy tale (which it is) that you could interact with. We all know that big bad wolves and talking goats are just stories, but, according to the Bible, all its stories are bona fide. They really happened, and what’s more,

they continue to happen. You can talk to angels and Jesus and God and all that and miracles do happen. Demons lurk about at all times trying to lure you into their evil traps. For a kid who was very scared of the dark, this notion seemed both terrifying and exhilarating.

I begged my parents to send me to Sunday school. They

grandmother’s house while she went to the hospital.

My grandmother gave me her bedroom to sleep in that night, while she slept on the pull-out couch. Looking back, I see what an incredibly selfless thing that was for her to do. I wonder if she somehow knew I needed to be alone. I slipped out of bed, went to the window, and slid

refused, so I ended up teaching Sunday school myself to a

underneath the heavy venetian blinds so I was face-to-

collection of my dolls and stuffed animals. I even conducted

face with the glass. I felt the individual slats of the blinds

Communion using cookies and juice.

against my back. I fell to my knees, clasped my hands

I read the Bible, said prayers every night, had a collection of angel figurines, and insisted on us saying grace before

together tightly, looked out the window at the totally starless sky, and asked God for the biggest favour I’d ever asked for.

every meal.

In whispered

My parents were baffled

tones, I asked

but indulged

God to please,

me.

please save my dad. I felt so

I knew

guilty and selfish

imaginary

for having ever

friends were

asked God for

just that—

anything trivial

imaginary.

at all—for a

But, this

good part in the

“God” person

school play, to

you could

get the Barbie

allegedly talk

I wanted for

to when you

Christmas—all of

had no one

it seemed so tiny

else to turn to

and meaningless

and apparently he always had time to listen and could maybe even do you favours from time to time. I used to pray to him to please make my parents stop fighting, to take away the chaos of our home,

compared to what I really and truly needed. Even in that moment, my days as a child were falling away from me.

I told God that if he saved my father that I would

to make it the way I always wanted it to be: calm and

become a nun. I would devote my entire life to him as

steady.

a servant in show of my gratitude. I begged and begged

One night, when I was 11, my mother came into my room and told me my father had just been rushed to the hospital. I immediately burst into tears. My mother told me to stop crying, and then she took me to my

silently, my breath forming faint condensation on the cold windowpane.

I climbed back into bed and eventually went to sleep.

When I woke up, I found out my dad was dead.

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It occurs to me now that my dad could very well have been dying or even dead when I made my plea with God. I wonder if he was in the throes of cardiac arrest while I knelt on that blue shag carpet. I wonder if he was

The Otherside Poem by Kuru Selvarajah, Art by Adrienne Dagg

beginning his journey of turning into stardust while I

wreckage of words.

stared at a night sky that had no stars at all. I wonder if

wisp of whisky breaths – sink deep,

maybe he prayed for something, too, in that very moment,

throat choked with hors d’oeuvres

if perhaps his faith, the one he was forced to have as a

can’t blow past this Haut couture; insecure

child, had returned to him. I wonder if he thought about

waiters struggling to keep their hands secure –

me then. If so, to borrow a line from Steve Martin’s

before you know it

Shopgirl, “we were connected in that moment and didn’t

tongues become paralyzed

even realize it.”

to roll out the r’s; to stand next to god

It also occurs to me that if I saw my father now, he probably wouldn’t know me. He died when I was 11. I’m 27 now; the child is long gone. So much has happened since then, and so much of it has been about him. The choices I’ve made, the people I’ve had in my life... None of it would have happened as it did if he had lived. I wonder who that person would have been. The silence his absence brings deafens me.

We come into this world with nothing; we leave with nothing. In the time between, all we really possess is what is contained inside of our own selves. When we diminish that, we become less, until we are so empty we are nothing.

No matter what happens to me, I have one thing I call mine. And even that isn’t fully mine. My name is the one my father had with him when he came to Canada as a young boy. He was born in a refugee camp, and never knew a home or possession until then. He was among the first people to be bestowed the title “refugee” by Sir Winston Churchill. I am the daughter of a refugee. My name, our name, is the one on my birth certificate, on his first passport that allowed him to leave Europe, on his death certificate, on his tombstone. No matter how lost I may get, no matter how long he has been gone, one thing connects me to myself and to him forever.

I can’t think of any possession better than that.

42

and whisper prayers in slurs; this buffet of wishes – and vicious stench of cologne along cloned suits – criss cross ties to rob the eyes – don’t laugh out loud – smile and nod.

No one needs to know what you didn’t know; you don’t eat the cookie after the fortune’s cold.

locks, bands of bearded weirdos peering out to the world from the insides of your pretty skull, looking for a moment only to retreat back into the warmth. You have brown eyes and bleached blonde hair and those glasses, the ones with no rims on the bottom, those knee high socks… your shimmering pentagram, crucifix and David star necklaces. I’m trying to hate you, but I just want to love you for the next five years, and only the next five years. Until I’m thirty-two and you’re twenty-five and we fight over the fact that you’ve just figured out what you want to do and I’ve just figured out that I want out of this glass of spilled sour milk I’ve become. When I’m bitter and boring, getting too drunk off

Young White Girls

By Joel Brown, Art By David Strupp Young white girl painted with pictures of red sparrows and

three drinks, and I’m trying to hook up my idiot friend with that cute black friend of yours who claims to like bourbon and Fanta. Young white girl, I want to love you until I can never stop saying “oh, when I was your age” and “honey, can you stop smoking in my apartment” and “I love you, I love you, but I can’t get up when you get home.”

Young white girl, I’m sorry but what is your name again and how come I blacked out? When

I come to, we’ve been seeing each other for a week and talking on the internet for three. We’re friends on the internet and

sinking schooners, bleached blonde hair in the afternoon,

we send each other pictures of famous writers high fiving

where do you get your money? I want your red hot love and

movie stars, and Flash videos of goats screaming and Jehovah’s

to play hide and go seek in your parent’s money and I want to

witnesses whispering. Her last name is Belarusian and she

pull that bleached blonde hair and be your Charles Bukowski.

sells jewellery to people, wants to be an eventual goldsmith,

I want that money. I’m destitute baby, and I am getting fat

and loves her neighbourhood more than her own mother.

again. I’m in this coffee shop with this young white girl and

She takes photos of dead people at the morgue and all of her

my piss smells like a barista’s wet hair; notes of sweat, dark

friends think she’s “a rising talent.” She’s young, she’s white,

murky espresso and can’t scrape enough together to buy this

and she’s a girl; I think maybe I could love her for five years.

young white girl a coffee.

She’s moving to Germany next month, so we have thirty days

Young white girl, staring into your own reflection on your cellular telephone; your headphones askew, garage rock climbing out of the weeping ringlets of those wheat gold

and nights to hold hands, tell each other secrets, and watch movies written by writers like me. She has these eyes that pop in the flash of the bulb, but I can never remember the

43

colour. I remember popcorn in the nude, an unfinished beer

I want Schubert, Mozart, I say. The Eminem is turned up and

on the night stand to wake up to the next morning, and her

in the brief intervals of silence between songs she is laughing

applying makeup in the corner of the room, but for the life

her white face red, as I sit befuddled, a comedic example of

of me, never the colour of her eyes. I shelter my disgusting,

uselessness. To make up for it, she orders in rotisserie chicken

fat body from the light of her eyes under the covers as she lays

with gravy and buns and I eat more than half of it, drinking

atop them; from space this would make a pretty good Velvet

her roommate’s beer.

Underground album cover. I never said to my mom when I was a kid: “When I grow up, I want to be this young white girl’s vintage clothing.”

There’s a picture of me writing about being on the internet

She tells me her best friend is working at this guitar shop down the street, and we should go check it out, and it’s snowing in April. Since the time we ate rice, I drank ten fingers of Oban whiskey, one Corona with a lime, one can

wearing last night’s clothes and this morning’s chewing gum.

of Red Stripe, two fingers of Dalwhinnie, and sipped a quick

My ex-girlfriend is suddenly a curator, and suddenly pregnant

glass of the shittiest whiskey from India which tasted like wet

and engaged, and she looks so happy. There’s otters holding

tar. Now I’m at some bar with guys I work with ignoring her

hands and every day of the year is Valentine’s Day; every

hot telephone love.

morning is a blessing, standing on the edge of a waterfall, tits out; my best friend from elementary school is named Nicholas and he lives in China now. That is all that I want to know about him. I tell her all of this and more in a letter that exceeds no more than one-hundred-and-forty-three characters.

I refer to her in passing as my young white girlfriend. She is

I can’t wait to get home to this young white girl I met in the coffee shop with the tattoos of ravens fighting over tinfoil, an anchor getting pulled away by a giant squid, the words KITTY FIGHT magically inked on her ten knuckles.

She asks me, if I’m a writer how come I don’t have a book published. I ask her, if she’s an adult how come she still watches cartoons, drinks bubblegum flavoured vodka, and

surprised I did not bike over to her place; I am surprised she

asks her parents for rent money. I talk about living in Paris,

is surprised, and she is even more surprised when I say that I

wearing shoes I purchased off a vagrant. I talk about my

took a cab as I was running late. We are surprised and we have

deteriorating relationship with my best friends, and I talk

something in common, and we start making out and I slam

about the geopolitical landscape in Russia as I know it while

her ass into the fridge, holding on to the whites of her thighs

she falls asleep in the crook of my gut. She half listens,

for dear life. I said I was running errands, but I was really

murmurs some nothings, and at once I am comfortable.

doing all of the sit-ups I humanly could before spending an hour in the shower and twenty minutes trying to shave the perfect beard, get that fine ninety-degree angle from the cleft of my earlobe to the line of the sideburn, just enough cologne that belongs to my roommate, that perfect part to the hair, the costume you put on, the one for the scouts from Boston in the stands.

She’s wearing a pink bra with neon green skulls on it and we eat rice while sitting on the pillows. She really likes smoking weed, and pillows with this obnoxious caricature of what a cat looks like in some Japanese dream.

44

The fuck did you put that Eminem record on for? I ask.

You make me salivate like really salty caribou jerky, I say to her. I want to fuck you like some great ocean in a blizzard of wild nothings, I say to her. What? she asks. I’m trying to dirty talk you, I say. Your voice, when you write, is that of a disenfranchised black male, she says, and I feel as if when we converse, we’re in some absurd French film, and that underneath it all, is this all about the sex?

We make love. In the morning she is nude modelling in Neukölln and living with a coven of nude models, and I am back in the coffee shop, smelling my own piss, listening to Beethoven, and writing about young white girls with an old, black voice; the fat painted on me, one coat at a time.

Mad Men in Bed:

Cinema Cycle

Kelsey Goldberg works out a method for profiting off of pregnancy and menstruation.

By Kelsey Goldberg, Art by Keven Robert Fong So I finally did it. I finally endured the cruel and unusual punishment of standing in line at Service Ontario to get OHIP. I was pretty excited by the notion that if I were to get hit by a car, I could get treated for my wounds without my parents having to mortgage their house. Or that my birth

and that I wouldn’t be forced to buy three months’ supply at once like my insurance company in the States insists on. I wasn’t covered by OHIP quite yet, but I was eagerly awaiting the numerous advantages that would be bestowed upon me once I got that magical little health card.

15 minutes later, I was pretty sure I was going to die of

control would now cost about $15–$20 a month (less if I got

boredom. I figured that if I scheduled my demise to coincide

it from a clinic) instead of the $60 a month I currently pay,

with the moment my health card was in my hand, I could

45

then be resuscitated at no cost to me. But I had already

mother and normally adore talking to her on the phone. But

jaywalked across Yonge Street earlier that day, so I had sort of

when she calls me on a day or at a time when she doesn’t

had my fill of near-death experiences.

normally call me, I always think there’s been another terrorist

At any rate, I was determined to stay entertained. Luckily for me, I have headphones and a device with access to all te media I want. YouTube to the rescue!

Except that YouTube sucks now, especially the phone app. Why? Why? WHY does the YouTube app think that I want fan dedications more than the original artist’s video? In what universe

attack in the States and that my mother is the sole survivor.

My point is, my blood pressure skyrocketed as I squeaked out “Hello? Mommy?! Is everything okay?” Turns out, everything was not. It wasn’t apocalyptic, either, but she wasn’t just calling me to tell me that “the new contestant on American

It was all too much: YouTube Ads! Birth Control! Health Coverage! Terrorism! War! Someone profits from all of these! Then it hit me. Why not exploit them all together before they completely exploit me.

could I possibly enjoy watching a bunch of Glee, fans covering a song in their bedroom? I have to sift through four pages of this crap before I finally find the video I want. Having found it, I click on it and BAM! Commercial. You want proof that human beings hate capitalism? Then watch the look of utter existential despair that plagues their faces when one of those ads starts to play.

Those ads…they’re vindictive! They tease you with that whole “You may skip this ad in 5 seconds” bullshit. Everyone knows the stupid “Skip Now!” button loads slower than the rest of the ad. By the time you’re able to press it, you’ve watched the whole commercial for Air Wick. Not only are they vindictive, the ads are illogically pained with the videos you want to watch! When I’m watching a KPOP video, I’m not in the mood to hear about Willie Nelson’s Greatest Hits.

Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” is not an appropriate video for an ad about Justin Bieber’s new album. And for god’s sake, if I’m watching an Iggy Azaelia video then it’s safe to assume that I know enough about rap to know that Nicki Minaj is to female rappers what Michelle Bachman is to female politicians.

Three or four failed attempts at YouTube viewing later, I was next in line when my mom called me. Now, I love my

46

Idol kind of looks like you, and well, not really because she’s black, but you have similar body types, and anyway, there’s an adorable dress at Banana Republic you should go try on,

because if you like it I’ll send it to you, because Dad keeps on commenting on how the clothes you’re wearing on Facebook are a little...sparse.” Instead, she said, “Honey, have you gotten healthcare there yet? Because our medical insurance company called and they have switched their coverage on birth control.

It now costs $100 a month, and we still have to buy three months at once.”

I was dumbfounded—$300 for birth control! What. The. Royal. Fuck!? If it used to cost $60, AND if it costs only about $15 in Canada then it’s safe to assume the production of it is not that expensive, so my insurance company basically just sat there and said, “Well our prices are pretty much unchecked by the government, so why not mark it up by 66%?” The decision was made with no other purpose than to garner profits. Why does someone else get to profit off of my body? Why does everything have to be about making a profit?

Why do I have to be constantly advertised to? I mean, if my reproductive choices are a commodity from which a third party can profit, shouldn’t that at least exempt me from being treated like a consumer?

It was all too much: YouTube Ads! Birth Control! Health Coverage! Terrorism! War! Someone profits from all of these!

Then it hit me. Why not exploit them all together before

for those guys packing the “Say hello to my little friend”

they completely exploit me. If the Scrooge McDucks of the

jumbo pack of condoms. They are just gonna whip it out and

world want to roll in their money, fine, but let them actually

do their thing, and when it’s over you’ll be unimpressed and

be subject to the free hand of the market. I’ve watched

have Tony’s questionable white stuff all over your face. If he

enough episodes of Mad Men to know that as a woman, if

whips out an “I’ll have what she’s having,” lie back and enjoy,

you can’t beat the Don Drapers of the world, you get into bed

and don’t forget to return the favour! If you are with a woman

with them. And if I can’t stop people from profiting off my

and she pulls out the “I’ve always relied on the kindness of

menstruation, I could at least have a say in who gets to profit

strangers” condom, she’s probably not gonna call you the

off my menstruation. How? Merchandizing! Movies should

next day, and you should probably get tested. Which really

use birth control, condoms, pregnancy tests, and the like as a

you should be doing anyway, and I don’t mean to sound like

form of merchandizing. That way I can associate the profits

I’m judging your hypothetical partner’s promiscuity. I’m just

garnered from my attempt to force my body not to ovulate

saying that even with all the amazingly sexually empowered

with the films I love.

women out there (those who can serve as the media-angels

This is a brilliant idea. Not only is it an untapped market for the movie industry, but the movies a person decides to associate their desired coitus accessories with can serve as a lovely little cheat-sheet about their personality. If a guy whips out the “Frankly my dear I don’t give a damn” condom, you’re probably gonna end the night a bit disappointed; same goes

to your sexual encounters), any woman who chooses Blanche Dubois when they could have chosen Gilda or even Satine, is probably as concerned with your well-being as Blanche is with Stanley’s.

This would also be a great way to see how different movies are reaching various demographics. The Seven Year Itch,

47

starring Marilyn Monroe, may seem like a movie that women today would love. But the Hot Fuzz Vagisil is outselling the The Seven Year Itch, in every major American city. You may think that any movie starring Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew McConaughey is just a chick flick. The Failure to Launch Viagra would beg to differ. Us ’90s kids like to think Titanic is just as much an integral part of our generation as Gone With the Wind was to our grandparents. But believe me when I say that 9 out of 10 geriatrics choose the “My Heart Will Go On” pacemaker.

Attaching your favorite movies to very personal moments like this can also lighten some of your more serious concerns and worries. “Inconceivable!” a new brand of Princess Bride birth control, so you can say “as you wish” without the worry.

Maybe you forgot to take your pill; the “Well Nobody’s Perfect” Plan B, courtesy of Some Like It Hot and MGM Studios, has you covered. Your boyfriend tells you he put the condom on when he didn’t? The “What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate” Plan B will make sure that your eggs stay as unfertilized as the 50 eggs Paul Newman eats in the movie. Worried you might be pregnant? That’s really heavy. Seriously, an unplanned pregnancy is a lot to deal with.

When you are looking at that white stick that’s covered in

So, you’re a writer...

Would you like to see your work in print?

your urine, you need to know it’s going to be accurate; luckily, the “You Can’t Handle the Truth!” pregnancy test really understands your psyche. Nine months later, when you need to put your little miracle up for adoption, you want to make sure it goes to a good home. The “Here’s Looking at You, Kid” home for adoption is a favourite amongst dignitaries and diplomats, but if you want your kid to have a more ‘artsy’ upbringing I’d suggest going through the “Nobody Puts Baby in a Corner” adoption agency.

Like all forms of advertising, however, you have to

We publish prose, poetry, original journalism and pretty much everything else.

If you’re interested, or if you just have some questions, get in touch with us at:

really think these things through. Putting your brand on the wrong item could be disastrous. I don’t care how well my movie-themed birth control tests with sexually active women ages 18–35, the “It’s a Good Day to Die Hard” abortion clinic is NOT a good idea.

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nest@gutterbird.com

Common Nonsense “They heard me singing and they told me to stop Quit these pretentious things and just punch the clock.”

-Arcade Fire, “Sprawl II”

By Thea Sigrund, Art By Ece Budak Midway through 2013, there is no

of bringing lessons from the past to

They worked weekends and summers to

doubt that decent jobs for young folks

life for children, of demonstrating

save up money so that they could keep

in Ontario are scarce, regardless of

that those who don’t know history are

their debt down.

educational level or skill specialization.

doomed to repeat it.

While the trend towards young adult

These are Ontario Millennials,

underemployment and unemployment

brought up by Boomers to believe that

has been observed in the media, there

anything you can dream of is achievable

is another paradigm shift taking place

if you work hard enough for it.

that Millennials tend to encounter when looking for and accepting their first job:

Millennials don’t remember a time

Then they graduated into an economy that was in the middle of “the Great Recession.”

Governments which had frozen or outright cut spending on social aid programming (Ontario Disability

before the “free market” mantra took

Support Program, Ontario Works)

hold in the early to mid-1980s; they

needed to demonstrate further cost-

were babies or not yet born at that time.

cutting initiatives in order to stay in

In the spring of 1995, their collective

power. That’s how we ended up with

that Master of Counselling who

fate was sealed when their parents and

Stephen Harper and former Mike

works as a dental office receptionist,

elders elected Mike Harris to implement

Harris disciples (Jim Flaherty, Jason

using her “people skills” to persuade

his “Common Sense Revolution.”

Kenney, Tim Hudak) leading our

that profit production is prized above contributing to the greater good.

What do I mean by this? I mean

clients to commit to expensive cosmetic procedures. I mean the Master of History who is using her

They grew up with the EQAO, the Double Cohort, the “new, modernized”

country through this tumultuous time.

How does this all relate to the

curriculum. They were promised that

receptionist and barista I described

if they made it into university despite

earlier? Those two are living and

these hoops to jump through, they’d be

working in Toronto. They held up their

on their way to enjoying the standard

end of the bargain negotiated with their

to be done. But that receptionist once

of living shared by Mom and Dad and

parents and grandparents back in June

dreamed of working with people and

their grandparents.

of 1995. They are the product of Mike

“communication skills” to sell venti Pikes at Starbucks.

These are legitimate jobs that need

families to build stable, sustainable communities. The barista once dreamed

So they studied hard, got admitted to universities and took out OSAP loans.

Harris’s Ontario. Underemployed and underpaid, they’ll be in limbo for years

49

to come, stuck paying off student loans on paltry wages while scrimping to save for the life their parents so easily had within reach when they were in their late twenties in the 1970s and 1980s.

Millennials, no matter their education or skill level, are stuck doing menial work that enriches their bosses and elders. This is the only way to ensure that their livelihoods are not sabotaged by “downsizing,” “creating efficiency,” or “constructive dismissal.”

These graduates are the product of the structure of our public schools and secondary education institutions. The economy handed to them allows small business owners and multinational corporations alike to use their skills for profit. While contributing to the bottom line, these young Ontarians struggle to house, feed, and clothe themselves while paying off their student loans.

As more workers lose income and stability, Millennials are ready and eager to contribute towards building sustainable communities. Our counsellor above longs to help launch and rebuild lives in this uncertain era, and our history teacher would love the opportunity to make sure that tomorrow’s leaders are equipped with the knowledge they need to avoid repeating the mistakes of recent decades.

These bright, energetic Millennials are worth meaningful employment, but for now they can only dream of such pretensions while punching the clock.

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So, you decided to hate the system.

Now what?

By Jake Morrow, Art by Stronghold Muzinaki

First off: Congratulations are in order! It’s doubtful that you came lightly to the realization that everything the majority of your friends and family believe in is complete horseshit. But now, there’s a lot to get done. It’s at this point that many would-be leaders of change stumble, and choose instead to reform the world piece by piece. For the rest of us, there’s real work to be done. The System—and its operator, The Man—has almost certainly done more to raise you than your own parents, so it’s okay to be feeling a little overwhelmed at the prospect of burning that motherfucker down. Luckily, I’ve compiled a quick guide to the three most important steps in your journey toward casting off the oppressive shackles of post-Thatcher Earth.

Step One: Change Completely.

You’re going to have to rethink all that you are.

Immediately. Chances are that everything you’ve done, consumed or thought about for the majority of your lifetime has only served to further The System’s stronghold on existence—you are the superstructure, asshole. Where’d you get the shoes you’re wearing? Directly from some sweatshopaddled, profit-maximizing corporation? Throw them out now, pseudo pleb. Oh, you got them vintage? Nice Try noob.

You’re still, like, promoting the wearing of whatever slavelabour-loving brand is stitched on the label. And don’t even get me started about how they make plastic, wool, and leather unless you want me to vomit all over your made-in-China hi-tops. Your best bet is to just throw out everything you own right now and start learning to garden and sew.

Some might suggest trying your best to change for the better day by day, starting with little things.

These are the types of people who shop at big box grocery stores with reusable bags to save five cents instead of quitting their jobs to grow their own cabbage in a corner of someone’s unfenced land. Go ahead and ask yourself whose side you want to be on.

I’ll be enjoying my rusty rustic coleslaw while you ponder.

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Step Two: Burn your idols. Burn everyone you know and love if they can’t get with the program.

Do not literally burn them—this step is a metaphor and the literal burnings don’t start until step three. The people you know are part of the problem, and it’s up to you to either immediately convert them to your new lifestyle, or belittle and crush them as quickly and as wholly as possible. If they can’t get with the program, they’re part of the problem. It’s important to note that while the world may or may not

Step Three: Burn this motherfucker down.

Now, I don’t want to suggest that anybody should use

violence to achieve utopia, but let’s just say you will probably have to use violence to achieve utopia. Look around you. Do you see how deeply engorged people are in their ways of life?

Most are not as rational and forward thinking as you and are unlikely to come to revolution of their own accord. Thus, you will probably have to burn down some shoe stores to get people’s attention, and that’s okay.

Speaking of the ends justifying the means, computers

technically need the free exchange of ideas and beliefs in

may seem like a symbol of mankind’s misplaced priorities

order to facilitate peace and understanding between everyone,

and the shifts toward work-over-pleasure and general

most people and their ideas are simply wrong and need to be

complacency, but did you know that you can Google the

taken down a few pegs. For best results, try making offhanded

phrase “How to make a bomb” and learn to make a bomb in

remarks about class warfare in your daily life and shouting

minutes? The open sharing of knowledge and processes across

maniacally during any debate you may get into in order to

a borderless society may be exactly the type of thing we need

drown out voices of opposition.

to stop the onslaught of globalization—let’s just hope the

In terms of the types of friends you should be making

in your new life, try to remember that you don’t want in any

neoliberals don’t figure this one out.

Hopefully, by following these three simple steps, you’re

way to have your friendships work for the “benefit” of society.

well on your way to blindly changing the world. For those

Immediately ask potential friends questions like “Why do you

who may not feel up to the challenge right away, I suppose

think Thomas Mulcair is just as bad as Stephen Harper?”or

you could always do little things like support initiatives and

“Do you have an address, and why not?” or “How much

politicians that champion the types of causes you hold dear,

fertilizer is normal to own?” This approach to meeting new

or calmly engage people in conversation on important issues

people should weed out anyone who might not be prepared to

under the guise that everyone is an independently thinking

eventually burn down a sneaker store (see step three).

person capable of forming their own opinion, but good luck with that. My advice to you lot: stay out of shoe stores. To the rest of you, the leather cabbage burns at midnight.

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COWER IN FEAR,

SCUMLINGS! Trans-dimensional warlord and avatar of destruction DREADLORD KURGH watches some movies.

By Dreadlord Kurgh, Art By Julia Matias Herein and henceforth is laid down the second of my INDEMNITUDES detailing the myriad failings and boundless miseries that constitute your bilious “culture.”

Already I have displayed with IRON CERTITUDE the inferiority and feebleness of your human sports. Now, I shall deconstruct with EXTREME PREJUDICE one of the most popular and celebrated of your motive-pictures.

STAR WARS! Star Wars, a film series from the mind of a PATHETIC HOMINID, is the tragic tale of a great man brought low by his weak and foolish offspring. The first film opens with a pair of ambulatory machines speaking to one another, a HIDEOUS PROFANITY which drove me to crush my viewing device with my hands and bludgeon to death three of the nearby slaves I had wisely allocated for that precise purpose.

Fortunately, I switched to my secondary visualizing

ultimate weapon, with which the aforementioned infernal machines have absconded. Realizing they have escaped, Vader wisely orders the passenger liner he has just assaulted to be destroyed and its crew slaughtered, with the exception of a single female he will later discover is his daughter.

Vader is a compelling and sympathetic character, but the film makes the seemingly bizarre choice to spend much of its running time focusing on his THOROUGHLY DETESTABLE enemies rather than the hero himself. Vader’s loyal but woefully incompetent warrior-slaves are unable to capture the machines, despite their being delivered to the magnificent DEATH STAR by a gaggle of misguided villains.

Vader slays one of these, a senile octogenarian, with such force that his physical form DISAPPEARS ENTIRELY. I was reminded while watching this scene of a duel I once had with the champion of a recently defiled city-state on some backward plane of existence or another. He fought reasonably well for a mortal, but my final blow was propelled by such UNADULTERED MIGHT that his torso exploded

apparatus. The film drastically improved but moments later

into vapor, his lifeless skull rocketing into the crowd of

with the appearance of DARTH VADER, a bold, merciless,

bystanders where it slew three and wounded countless others.

presumably SEXUALLY VIRILE military commander

So elated was I by the SHEER EXCESSIVENESS of my

tasked with crushing an incompetent and morally bankrupt

foe’s destruction that I ordered his home district destroyed

insurgency. His objective is to retrieve the plans for his

instantly for his insolence, rather than sacrifice its inhabitants

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one by one to the Burnbeasts as is customary. This act of

day that I may make myself supine before the maddeningly

mercy, of course, was mirrored by Vader in the film with the

non-euclidian forms of the DEMON GODS once more,

DEATH STAR’s destruction of Alderaan.

carried forth by the rivers of blood unleashed in my

Later on, Vader pilots a spacecraft and personally slaughters the entire rebel force attacking his glorious battle station, with

NUMBERLESS CONQUESTS! -- But I digress.

Vader’s loyalty to his Emperor is evidently inferior to the

the exception of a single shrill farm-serf introduced earlier

undying HORRORLUST in which I hold my Dread Masters,

in the film. Unfortunately this unimpressive whelp is able to

as in the end his idiot son convinces Vader to destroy the

obliterate the DEATH STAR with a single improbable shot,

Emperor. This caused me to fly into a rage which rendered my

though Vader himself escapes to plot his vengeance.

viewing chamber UTTERLY UNLIVABLE and annihilated the remaining chattel I

The second film is

had assigned to the task of

largely concerned with said

slaking my frustration.

vengeance, though again the

This does not detract

director inexplicably chooses to lavish screentime on the

from the quality of the film

peons whom are its target. I

however. FAR FROM IT!

particularly enjoyed the scene

Instead it reminds us of

toward the end in which the

the fragility of the mortal

fragile farmhand from the

forms we are unfortunately

previous film is BRUTALLY

forced to assume. Always

BEATEN and amputated by

must we be vigilant against

Vader, who then reveals that

the encroachment of such

he is the boy’s father. Rather

weaknesses as mercy,

than reacting with elation,

compassion and reason.

the suckling piglet wails and

Finally I understood the

attempts suicide, at which

director’s strange fascination

point I was so convulsed with

with Vader’s enemies; ever

laughter that I spilled my

are we but a hair’s breadth

mug of FIREALE across the

away from becoming that

room, severely burning two

which we despise, as long as

further servants.

we persist in this tepid and fallow realm.

The third film introduces Vader’s dark master, THE EMPEROR, a being of pure hatred and malice contained within the deceptively fragile form of a human. Naturally I was reminded of my own service to the great and terrible DEMON GODS of URULAK, long may they tower menacingly over the feebleness of man. Oh, URULAK! How I long to return to your bubbling, acrid plains! How I pine for the sting of your ferocious winds, the clang of your razor plants! My black heart beats only for the

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As such I give the Star Wars Trilogy Kurgh’s highest possible rating: SATISFACTORY. With that, I throw myself into the conquest of your Earth with RENEWED VIGOUR. When the death knell of your pathetic race is finally sounded, you shall have GEORGE LUCAS to thank.

END COMMUNICATION.

Mandy Taylor

Gutter-Quiz with Quizmaster Joe! If you were to lead a cult or religion, what kind would it be?

Cults, religions, they’re pretty much the same. They require devoted worship, imaginary friends, rules, money, and followers. We often like to make fun of scientologists for buying into something that fell out of a sci-fi writer’s head, and then we go call that writer a bastard, but really we’re all just jealous that L. Ron Hubbard scammed millions of people into believing one of his space tales was true. The guy was a well-known science FICTION writer and still managed to succeed in convincing people that this particular one was true—and justified a religion based on it. And for ALL of the money too! What a fucking genius. Wish you could do something like that? Want to start your own religion? Answer these multiple choice questions and see what kind you’re best suited to lead!

1. You’re planning a big-ass party/event. What would you serve your guests? a) Cosmic Freedom Juice: 3 parts grape Kool-aid, 1 part cyanide. b) PBR, Jell-O shooters, and a magazine. c) Cookies, lemonade, and the good word from Christ. d) A buffet. No one wants to bang on an empty stomach. e) I don’t host many parties. I usually share my meagre findings with the great Xinofqmagnaphoriusnin-na-na, who is always with me.

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2. When you and your followers die, where do you end up? a) I will go to a beautiful paradise of blue and yellow and purple hills, where the clouds will get me high, snacks will appear as soon as I imagine them, and there will be kittens and unicorns that poop brownies and chicken wings of every flavour. And cocaine trees as far as the eye can see. b) I will not die. Xinofqmagnaphoriusnin-na-na will come inside me and I will become him and we will rule all with a fist of platinum and rubies, and crush all who thought I was crazy. c) Our souls will be released into the stars and we will join the collective voice that I represent. But only once we kill 8 virgins, eat their hearts, and drink of the Cosmic Freedom Juice that will release us from our physical forms on the night of the 13th full moon. d) We will go to the Kingdom of Heaven and the Lord Christ will thank me for my work saving souls with his good word. e) First, I will die having the most amazing orgasm and will continue to writhe in ecstasy in the great beyond.

All of those I leave behind will engage in group sex to honour my life.

3. What is your ideal place of worship? a) The world is a church of Xinofqmagnaphoriusnin-na-na. To preach his awesome word, a street corner does just fine. b) A bar, but a gutterbird release party is better. c) A white Malibu mansion with an infinity pool. d) Anywhere really. Fucking is freedom. e) The house of God. 4. Next to you, who do your followers worship? a) The Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost. b) Sex. What aren’t you getting about a sex cult? c) Billy Cudgel and the almighty bottle. d) There is no other. I am the collective voice that calls for our return to the stars. e) The great and magnificent lord Xinofqmagnaphoriusnin-na-na.

5. The best attire for worship is... a) Whatever I’m wearing right now. b) A white bathrobe. c) Anything sexually suggestive. d) Xinofqmagnaphoriusnin-na-na desires we wear two coats (one to protect the other), pants held up with a simple cord, any cardboard box our feet fit into, and tinfoil hats to prevent the demon government from plaguing our minds. e) Business casual, a crucifix, and Jesus love.

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What kind of cult would you lead?

Results: 1) a-0, b-4, c-1, d-3, e-2; 2) a-4, b-2, c-0, d-1, e-3; 3) a-2, b-4, c-0, d-3, e-1; 4) a-1, b-3, c-4, d-0, e-2; 5) a-4, b-0, c-3, d-2, e-1 (0-2 points) -

Manson-esque murder suicide cult: You’ve got some serious issues, dude, but your

followers are definitely crazier. Your little family believes that you are their one and only saviour and will do anything, ANYTHING, to please you. From torture, sex, and murder to mass suicide, you never have to do any of that psychotic shit ever again. Your crazy rantings have made you a god, and you’re taking full advantage while your cult lasts. Too bad you’re a lunatic who is going to jail and/or going to get dead, or else you’d be able to get every penny out of your desperate, misled followers. One must always please one’s leader, right?

(3-5 points) - Plain

old Jesus shit: Whether you’re knocking on doors or singing folk songs, you and your

followers are just filled with Jesus love. Yawn...You’re against anything cool, you’re secretly a really bad person (though you seem so nice), and you’re all pretty fucking boring. I’m glad you’ve gotten yourself a little parish, but Jesus definitely wants you to stop bothering him and have some fun. While I’m sure the Kingdom of Heaven is nice, it sure isn’t going to be as cool as the sweet ass party the rest of us are all going to have in Hell.

(6-10 points) - Cult of One/Crazy dude on the street/ ALL HAIL XINOFQMAGNAPHORIUSNIN-NA-NA!: You’ve found yourself a pretty cool faith and a pretty cool god. Too bad your religion is a party of one. Your crazy, paranoid rants might sound like the good word in your head, but when it turns out you’re just yelling shit on the street while moms tell their kids to ignore the crazy person, you might have a problem. For you, free-ganism and park bench naps are a choice AND a requirement, which is great because no one is going to rent your ass a job. You might not have any followers, but we’re all heathens anyway. We’re all pretty scared of you and your crazy eyes, so we’ll just back off and refrain from raggin’ on your cord.

Give our best to Xinofqmagnaphoriusnin-na-na, ok?

(11-15 points) - Sexy

sex cult of desire and explosive orgasms: Wow, your followers are really

attractive. Wouldn’t you like to have sex with all of them? Well, lucky for you, they are all members of a sex cult and you’re their leader! They’d be crazy not to fuck you! While the spiritual is kind of cool, physical gratification is your god, and inner peace and enlightenment come from finding your true climax. A round of applause for you and your clan! Your cult is the sexiest there is, and there are so few rules too: all must consent, all must enjoy, and all must cum! And your complimentary buffet was a great idea!

(16-20 points) - Guttertology

– The church of incredible awesome: Congratulations! Your

amazing amazingness has led you to find the best kind of church you could lead: Guttertology. You believe in pleasure, degenerate behaviour, and just being your wonderful self. The epic high—and artistic success—is all you desire and you’re more than willing to share a joint with anyone who has a like mind. While you worship the bottle, Cudgel is probably your messiah, and the pigeon his symbol. You idolize the new levels of drunken sleaze he manages to find every day of his life. There is no rock bottom for you, just more and more hedonism. It’s beautiful. You are the artistic underclass leading the artistic underclass and proud of it! Let’s all get shots!

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Horoscopes Because We’re Drunk!

By Madam Rose, Art By Adrienne Dagg

Gemini (May.21-Jun.20) – You really like to stir the shit pot. I hope you have to lick that spoon.

Cancer (Jun.21-Jul.22) – All of that vomiting that comes with chemo is enough to make anyone a little crabby.

Leo (Jul.23-Aug.22) – Rawr...

Virgo (Aug.23-Sept.22) – Your next sexual encounter will be a lot like throwing a hot dog down a hallway.

Libra (Sept.23-Oct.22) – I am eternally grateful for the fact that your death will cause me to suffer no grief.

Scorpio (Oct.23-Nov.21) – Life will never be as easy as you are.

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Sagittarius (Nov.22-Dec.21) – I assumed that you thought your life was a drinking game, because every time you breathe, you take a drink.

Capricorn (Dec.22-Jan.19) – Keep on reaching for that rainbow and the dreams you never had.

Aquarius (Jan.20-Feb.18) – Everyone knows that you hurt yourself masturbating. Stop claiming they’re sports injuries.

Pisces (Feb.19-Mar.20) – Your dramatic crisis is imaginary. I’m sorry to say this but you’d better cancel that pity party you were planning because the turnout is going to be pitiful.

Taurus (Apr.20-May.20) – You’re so bull-headed, I bet you’re horny all the time.

Aries (Mar.21-Apr.19) – You’re so frigid that the rain is the only thing that gets you wet.

Sex

With Matt Smutt

By Matthew Smutt

Thank you to everyone for contributing your questions this time around! Ya’ll rock. Please continue to disclose your private thoughts, questions and desires through the anonymity of the Sex Box. Let’s be filthy, guys.

What’s the best way to teach a lady how to eat a lady out?

Practice makes for perfect cunnilingus. There isn’t any real

Any suggestions for how I would go about having sex with a box?

Please stop trying to have sex with the box. It was terribly

sticky the last time I got it back.

What do I do when I love a person for the way they make me feel between the legs, but my best friends hate them? I want the feeling to not stop.

Do you have a relationship with this person just because

way to develop a skill, sexual or otherwise without experience.

of the feelings between your legs or because you are dating

Honest communication about what’s working for you and

them? You mention you don’t want the feeling to stop, so I’ll

gentle direction is key. People can’t learn what to do or what

try to give advice based on any possible contingency.

works without some kind soul offering advice throughout their learning process. It’s a lot to take on and you you might not be comfortable playing sexual mentor with this individual, but my suspicion is if you are referring to a specific person, you want to keep them around for a bit. The upside is that there’s lots and lots of oral sex to be had!

Eat her out in the way that you want to be eaten out.

Show her what feels good because of what you’ve learned throughout your queer sexual life. Perhaps institute some kind of gold star system for when a good job is done.

It might take a bit of time and, as mentioned, buckets of oral-vaginal exchanges, but ya’ll will get there.

If this is a purely sexual relationship right now you really don’t owe your friends any explanation. Sexual relationships with other people can exist entirely separately from your social groups. Just make space for both in your life that doesn’t require forced interactions between the two.

If you are comfortable with this person and are being treated fairly by them, and your friends are telling you

to stop being with them because of their feelings, then whatever. You are the one fucking this person, not your friends. If this person hates your friends for no reason and helps to create a hostile environment between you and your friends, be cautious. That’s red alert shit right there. You are the one who has familial connections with your friends; your significant other does not. The SO doesn’t automatically get a

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say in the people you are friends with.

You are the one in charge of both whom you date and who your friends are.

You might not be able to make everyone like each other or always get along, but you can speak to both your friends and your SO and let both parties know that the other isn’t going anywhere. While they don’t need to love each other, it would speak volumes about their love for you if they would look past the things they dislike about the other to see your happiness as important in both you sexual and social life.

How do I tell my B-friend I want to sleep with other guys?

Very carefully.

Opening up a relationship to secondary partners is dependent on honesty, strength within a relationship, and willingness to navigate issues as they may come up.

Your b-friend might be open to the idea and he might not, you are the only real judge of that. Start slow if you need to; perhaps bring up the idea of having a threesome.

Conversations about what that would look like and if you would both be ok with it will start a dialogue about other

keeping him as your primary lover, you’ve got to give your partner the same option.

If you start slow, and explore together at first while remaining honest with each other about whether or not it’s working, you might soon find your relationship is strong enough to maintain itself as a poly relationship. It’s also very possible that your partner will not want a poly relationship. If that’s the case, you need to think about how important your current partner is to you and how important it is for you to sleep with other guys. There’s no right or wrong answer; it’s for you to decide what’s important to you in your life.

If one is a devout Catholic but finds the majestic beauty of the altar arousing, is it a sin to subsequently ejaculate involuntarily during mass?

If you are ejaculating involuntarily, it is absolutely a sin. It’s the Catholic Church for fuck’s sake. The church takes special care to judge all sorts of actions a person can’t control. A shame sweet spot, if you will.

Submit your sex questions to the Sex Box at gutterbird events or by email at sex@gutterbird.com. I would also enjoy at least one person sending their message via owl.

A boy can dream.

people having sex with both of you. This means that there will need to be a certain wilingness for you to let your b-friend explore his sexuality. A poly relationship needs to be a two-way street. If you want to explore other partners while

Fishstcks by Ian Moreau

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Contributors Artists

Adrienne Dagg David Strupp Drew Petursson Ece Budak Emily Dalton Evee Fex-Chriszt Ian Moreau Hilary Killam Julia Matias Kevin Robert Fong Mandy Taylor Rob Mirsky Roman Mope Stronghold Muzinaki Jack Coltman Robert MacNeil Keither Eager David Waldman Billy Cudgel

Writers

Thea Sigrund Brock Hessel Billy Cugel Dominique Bechard Kelsey Goldberg Dreadlord Kurgh Hannah Robbins Saturn C. Powers Jacob Morrow Joel Brown Kuru Selvarajah Matt Smutt Lea Lawrynowcz Rachel Ganz Natalie Kaye Cody Ovans

Front Cover Art by Jack Coltman

Back Cover Art by Mandy Taylor

Inside Cover Art by Robert MacNeil

Lizzie Violet

Inside Cover Art by Keith Eager NEST issue 11 © 2013 gutterbird 401 Logan Ave, Unit 219, Toronto, Ontario, M4M 2P2 Printed by CML Printing 919 Danforth Avenue, Toronto, Ontario. ISSN 2291-157X All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval sys- tem, or transmitted, in any form or in any means – by electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise – without prior written permission. All rights to original submissions to NEST are held exclusively by their creators and are printed with permission.

Disclaimer: the views and opinions expressed in all articles and other creative works are solely those of the original author and do not necessarily reflect the position of NEST magazine, its editors, gutterbird, or its governing collective.

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