Public Defamation by The Slingshot Newspaper

To set the record straight isn’t the easiest of endeavors. In the recent issue of Slingshot Newspaper, the editor said that a tall man wouldn’t leave women of the Slingshot collective alone. Wow. That’s a whole lot of discredit. That editor also said that I had behaved in a histrionic manner and that had been a disturbance to their collective. He didn’t use the word histrionic.
The editor of Slingshot went to law school at UC Berkeley and is an attorney. I attended the San Francisco Art Institute where I minored in Photography and majored in Urban Studies. I find his tangents as difficult to deal with as he does mine. I’m not an anarchist, I’m a socialist, so I’m not in the click with the collective in some ways. I was an anarcho-pacifist, and although many of my former beliefs are yet instilled in my heart, it’s only important to me. It isn’t up to me to tell him that his far left field considerations on far out humor does not relate to everyone, and frankly there isn’t any way for him or others in the collective to comprehend much of my creative agency. Something about the edit room of the Slingshot must somehow inspire far left field creativity. He fails to mention this in his current editor’s comments. To say the least I don’t believe he is being fair about this at all.
When I was in college as a return student, one of the major set-backs I discovered was classism. In the 1990s when I originally attended, everyone wore black, and on any given morning it would seem students had crawled out of the night clubs and speak easy’s and into the classroom. By 2004 the college seemed like an Eddie Bauer catalog.
One woman challenged me constantly, would roll her eyes, not accept criticism, not answer my peer feedback, and that of others, and would sometimes refuse to offer any, her comments always seemed hostile to me. I had to tell her repeatedly that I had read feminist writings in the 1990s when I was in [it was either Civ or Methodologies of Modernism…or both,] college earlier and that I wasn’t out to ‘get’ her or anything, and that I hoped she would drop her animosity. She thought I was aggressive and boorish, and her attitude indicated that weirdos from Berkeley should just simply die there. She was boorish and aggressive if somewhat less so. Eventually I was told that I was up for academic review. Apparently she was a low-income person trying desperately to live up to societal norms and had assumed that I thought she was rich and some kind of hater. Just the hater part, I thought she was misandrist, and/or a classist, and ageist. So it turned out that I had attended the required feminist discourse, and that I was also low income, and likely due to unemployment, lower income that she, it was never contemplated what she thought of income inequality[1] although classism and sexism were discussed at length, as well as ageism. As a returning student I was in my thirties, no acumen of my wisdom had been seemed to be considered by her by any means, and not having been a college student for almost a decade had definitively been one of my known set-backs. That shit was dismissed, and she went on to find a better job, a husband, and they would go on to breederville somewhere in the city and live happily ever after. It is not known whether or not her and her husband and child made the Eddie Bauer catalog. She was much nicer after she got married, I have to say, and she even stood up for me when systemic classism and ageism reared their ugly head within her vicinity at times, later on as we entered grad school. I always felt that I was fair about my reviews of her artwork and tried to stand by her at times regarding her risqué art moments.
The Slingshot reminds me of this and threads in my memory most prominently with my thesis study group in graduate school. I enjoy proof-reading and offering bits and pieces of advice when I think I have something to offer. I did not receive an academic review regarding my thesis group, but some mad shit went down as you can probably imagine. It got to the point that I had to wear a used suit with a tie to my college because I was constantly a target of classism during the train commute, and that air of distinction seemed to permeate into the classroom. I would sometimes wear my funky professor outfit to Berkeley’s People’s Park for the Food Not Bombs meal to catch a free meal despite my commute schedule. One transient wanted to know if I was rich or crazy. “I’m an art student,” I replied. So many idiots with so many questions, a question from a Person from the Park was actually a relief.
Knowing that I could be marked down a grade for not participating I inquired of the Slingshot collective about my academic essay peer reviews. I thought that the material was somewhat poignant and timely, and possibly instrumental. [I have not been a student for over four years. I’m merely suggesting that participation is relevant. Humor, my emphasis.] You can take a look at the results of this if you like.[2] It turned out not to be accepted or even appreciated by the collective. This happens sometimes.
Two young women of the collective were the only ones to read or offer constructive criticism. I thought that most of the criticism was somewhat not of purpose. One straight or possibly bisexual woman was the harshest critic. In a polite tone I expressed my disagreement and that I would prefer in the future that she find a way to commit to simply giving a critique of the work, or possibly to not offer any advice at all, either would have been fine. The ‘good cop’ in this scenario happened to be a gay or bisexual woman and I explained that I still had to plainly disagree with most of her sentiments, although I could appreciate her honesty and the fact that she offered her criticism with a minimum of adversarial tonality. I said that although some solutions were needed, I didn’t think it would be possible in this case. These young women are/were undergraduate college level, and in this case their considerations for some reason did not resonate with me as the correct overall solution. Although it was a long drawn out process, I wanted criticism, I hadn’t expected to be the subject of cis-hatred, or whatever the fuck it was. To be fair in the past others in these proof reading sessions have had these kinds of scenarios occur.
The two men who were in attendance merely skimmed the readings of mine. It sort of dawned on me that perhaps they thought that the young women needed the practice or something, but the truth was that they simply did not wish to read it. Both of the women would have liked to have been informed of that fact, because they would have plainly not have read it either. Whatever the case there is an issue of my personal defamation by members of the Slingshot here,and I for the record would like to state that I was not trying to cause any tension with the Slingshot collective.
There is some question of systemic privilege and prejudice regarding the Slingshot, and a recent account of that can be read here [3] which involves myself and another person who felt that she was not treated equally by the collective.

[1] The Department Head of Urban Studies interrupted the meeting to contextualize this issue. She is a very nice lady.
[2] https://www.academia.edu/8986257/Essay_Review_Testing_Theories_of_American_Politics_Elites_Interest_Groups_and_Average_Citizens_AND_Essay_Review_The_US_Occupy_Movement_Since_The_Eviction_From_The_Squares
[3] https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2014/11/29/18764821.php