Wednesday News: Independent Bookstore Day, NSA backdoor, stealthing, and The Outsiders turns 50
Publishing Newsindependent bookstores / malware / NSA backdoor / sexual violence / stealthing / The Outsiders / YA genre13 Comments
Independent Book Store Day: Community is key for these local book sellers – So Saturday, April 29th, is Independent Book Day, because apparently we need a Day for everything. Is this a U.S. trend? In any case, a day dedicated to reading and to books is a good day, so check out your local booksellers to see if they are holding any special events this weekend. It’s not just the big book chains that compete with independent stores, but the entire galaxy of entertainment, and the myriad ways we have to consume stories.
Independent bookstores have had to adapt in an age when there is a “competition for eyeballs,” said Carrie Obry, executive director of the Midwest Independent Bookstore Association. “It’s hard to break through the noise and other entertainment options that you can hold in your hands, which is usually where books used to go.” . . .
Independent Bookstore Day conveys two important messages. One is for community support. “For these bastions of literacy, community and individuality to survive, it can’t be just one day,” Aleksy says. “We need each other every day.”
And the other is gratitude. “We are still here because people shop here,” Albrecht says. “We have survived for more than 30 years and that is because of this community.” – Chicago Tribune
NSA backdoor detected on >55,000 Windows boxes can now be remotely removed – Despite Microsoft’s unsupported assertion that anywhere from 30K to 100K Windows machines are infected with DoublePulsar (according to multiple scans), a March update from the company apparently contains a patch for the malware. Countercept has also come up with a way to disinfect machines remotely. And apparently it can also be removed by rebooting the machine, although that does not defeat ongoing vulnerability. There is a lot of good info here, as well as a link to the March Windows software update, in case you missed it.
After Microsoft officials dismissed evidence that more than 10,000 Windows machines on the Internet were infected by a highly advanced National Security Agency backdoor, private researchers are stepping in to fill the void. The latest example of this open source self-help came on Tuesday with the release of a tool that can remotely uninstall the DoublePulsar implant. . . .
On Tuesday, security firm Countercept released an update to the DoublePulsar detection script it published last week. It now allows people anywhere on the Internet to remotely uninstall the implant from any infected machine. Researcher Kevin Beaumont told Ars that detecting DoublePulsar involves sending a series of SMB—short for server message block—queries to Internet-facing computers. By modifying two bytes of the query, the same person can remove the infection from any computers that test positive. The script isn’t the only way to clean compromised devices. As Ars reported last week, the ultra-stealthy DoublePulsar writes no files to the hard drives of computers it infects, a feature that causes it to be removed as soon as the computer restarts. – Ars Technica
Stealthing: Inside the world of men who remove condoms during sex without consent – Recent Yale Law School graduate Alexandra Brodsky has published a new paper in the Columbia Journal of Gender and Law on the phenomenon of “stealthing,” in which men – primarily with female sexual partners – remove condoms during sex. Because there’s always a new way to sexually violate someone. Did you even know this was a thing? For some reason it got me thinking about Susan Elizabeth Phillips’s Nobody’s Baby But Mine, a book that so massively pissed me off I can still barely talk about it without sputtering, and I can only hope that stealthing isn’t going to be romanticized in the genre as a sign of twu wuv.
For most men, the reason they remove condoms – often when changing positions so their partner doesn’t notice – is because they prefer the feel of sex without wearing one. But some also do so to exert power over their partners. . . .
Brodsky says she decided to undertake the research when she was in law school in 2013 and realized how many of her friends were “struggling with forms of mistreatment by sexual partners that weren’t considered part of the recognized repertoire of gender based violence – but that seemed rooted in the same misogyny and lack of respect.” – Yahoo/The Independent
Happy 50th Anniversary To ‘The Outsiders,’ The Book That Created A Genre – I had no idea that S.E. Hinton had The Outsiders published when she was only 18. Which was 50 years ago (that’s 1967 for those of us who haven’t had our coffee yet). So the argument is that YA was created in 1957 with The Outsiders? Hmmm, that sounds more like the opening assertion of a debate, although clearly the novel has had a huge impact on books, films, television, and even stereotypes of USian teen life.
Hinton was only 15 when she started writing the book, which was later turned into a film, and 18 when it was published. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, she said, “There was nothing realistic being written for teens at that time. It was all, like, Mary Jane Goes to the Prom. And I’d been to a few proms, and that was not what was happening. I really wanted to read a book that dealt realistically with teenage life as I was seeing it.”
So, instead of penning what was essentially an instruction manual for how teens ought to behave, Hinton took a critical look at how kids did behave, where she lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The Outsiders examines class, and the role it can play not only in how students interact, but in their ability to put their best foot forward in school. – Huffington Post
“XYZ Day” is a marketing gimmick, so we will have one for everything whether we need one or not.
I have a 21-year-old result of unauthorized condom removal, so it’s not a new phenomenon. There’s even porn glorifying the practice, helping men who can’t separate fantasy from the reality of being a responsible sexual partner justify their violations. I think, in contrast, the romance community would be very vocal in debating “this is grossly toxic” vs. “everybody knows it’s make-believe, lighten up,” thereby extending the discussion of real-life boundaries and safety women continually need to have because our boundaries and safety are continually threatened.
I don’t think stealthing is a new thing, just a really messed up one.
As for The Outsiders, I’d be more enthusiastic about its 50th anniversary had I not found out S.E.Hinton’s twitter. Her homophobic tantrums to what was a rather general question tainted what had been one of my fave books. :(
I know that Record Store Day has been around for a while (Wikipedia says 2007), and it’s celebrated in a number of different countries, but apparently Independent Bookstore Day is much newer and US-centric so far. My local indie, which is an excellent bookstore and has been around for ages, is having a big celebration.
So Hinton thinks she created the YA genre and there was nothing good to read before her book? I think Anne Shirley would like to have a word with her. I know I would, but I’m afraid I’d get the Twitter treatment all over again.
P.S. I know the Anne books aren’t YA, but they were formative reading for me in my youth as they were for many other older children and adolescents. The fact that publishers hadn’t designated a YA genre doesn’t mean we old people didn’t have appropriate and rewarding books to read when we were young.
Ugh, the stealthing article is in the BEAUTY section. F U, YAHOO.
@Ren Benton: I’m sorry you were a victim of stealthing.
Heaven knows I love the romantic/sexual fantasy debates, but I think for me the crux of the issue is a bit different. I think the reason the Phillips novel came to mind is because I always hated the way Jane’s character was IMO betrayed by a decision to sexually violate Cal (and I pretty much hate Cal, so it’s not a defense of that alphahole). I felt that the whole thing was treated cavalierly, and that the ‘book smart woman does something stupid in life’ shtick was insulting and logically inconsistent. And I say this as someone who has no issue with taboo sexual fantasies, including rape fantasy. However, to me, the thing with Jane and Cal wasn’t a fantasy, but rather a plot device to get Jane pregnant, create conflict, and ultimately bring her and Cal together – because, of course, they were Meant To Be. And I can see stealthing being used as the same kind of romance plot device, rather than as sexual fantasy. Does that make sense?
@Sunita: Or how about Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn? I get not wanting to fall into the “Pride and Prejudice is really a romance novel” hole, but I agree that Hilton’s claim seems hyperbolic at the very least. This is interesting, too: http://blogs.slj.com/afuse8production/2016/03/29/what-was-the-first-ya-novel/ I *do* think The Outsiders has been hugely influential, but, you know, so has 50 Shades.
@AnnaM: It looks like Yahoo puts a lot of its stories about women’s sexual health in Beauty, subcategory Health. Which is interesting.
@Ren Benton: Wow. I’m sorry that happened to you.
@Janet: Jane’s choices in Nobody’s Baby But Mine made absolutely no sense from a scientific perspective, and she was supposed to be a scientist. SEP’s premises are often hard to buy into, but that was one of the worst.
The stealthing article got me thinking about Kathleen Gilles Seidel’s old category, Mirrors and Mistakes. There’s a scene in there in which the couple have no condoms on hand but agree to practice withdrawal. But then, during the act itself, the hero says something like “Let me give you a child.” The heroine refuses but he goes ahead anyway.
I also thought of the recent Julie Anne Long book, The Legend of Lyon Redmond, in which the hero, upon his reunion with the heroine after years apart, insists that because he’s not a boy anymore and therefore won’t spill in his trousers ever again, even though the heroine is engaged to and plans to marry another man.
I’ve heard The Outsiders considered the first YA novel for years, from a number of kid lit sources, so I don’t think Hinton necessarily initiated that claim. I’m sure there have been many essays written supporting, and refuting, the assertion.
Re: Stealthing
I remember growing up hearing that a relative had deliberately put holes in his condoms to get his wife pregnant. Two children resulted. It was treated as a type of joke, as if he ‘got one over’ on his wife or his wishes took precedence over her concerns (possibly health issues). It was an odd feeling then and truly even worse now that I am old enough to consider the reality.
I wonder if the children know… probably because it was discussed so openly that they do know…. and how do they feel about it?
This was 50 years ago. Times change and attitudes change, but that doesn’t make the actions any more ok.
Re: stealthing.
I wonder if anyone here could recommend romance novels where the couple practice Safe sex without the use of a condom, for example, The hero pulling out at the last minute.
@Anon: I can think of one book but it’s not one I would recommend. Maybe ask again in the DA Open Thread?
@Janet: I’m so glad to hear you say that about Nobody’s Baby but Mine. That is my most loathed book; it makes me extremely stabby. After reading all of the great reviews, I expected to at least like the book, but the behavior of Jane and Cal was just too much. Her actions were beyond the pale and his treatment of her made me want to kick him in the nuts.
@Janet: After reading your post yesterday and then commenting, I mentally reviewed a bunch of books I read when I was 10-13, some of which were designated for children and others which were not but were suitable for children. There were quite a few which I don’t hear discussed nowadays but which I enjoyed a lot and would happily reread.
@Kris Bock: I’ve heard and read both sides of the argument as well; I think I was mostly reacting to the quotes from Hinton in the HuffPo article.
Sunita – yes so many times about many awesome books that I have read at that age. Shakes head .