Here at Flavorwire, we pride ourselves on not only writing some of the best content on the Internet, but keeping an eye on all of the great writing that other folks on the ‘Net are doing, too. Today, we have an interview with rap legend Lil’ Kim, an op-ed on the current state of superhero movies, a brief statement from xHamster concerning their decision to ban access to their site in North Carolina, and a report on a powerful new art show in Los Angeles that deals with police brutality.
On Rolling Stone , Elias Leight talks to Lil’ Kim about her recent Lil Kim Season mixtape release, her attachment to Brooklyn and its rising musicians, and her legacy as a rap icon.
Though Lil’ Kim’s legacy as one of the most influential rappers in recent memory is solidified, the past few years have seen the Brooklyn-native squirming to maintain her status up against the competition. Nevertheless, Kim is still releasing music (albeit much more slowly), and doesn’t at all seem bitter about the current space that she occupies in the scene.
You’re in season; you may be out of season for a little bit; everyone comes around full circle. You have to know when the music is changing, and it’s coming full circle. I always reinvent myself. I’ve never left the scene; I’ve never missed a beat. I was always in the clubs; I was always at somebody’s show; I was always in the midst of it.
On Broadly, Diana Tourjee speaks with a rep from xHamster — the porn company that recently made headlines for banning access to their site in North Carolina — about their decision to take a visible stance against the HB2 bill.
By now, everyone should be familiar with HB2, the transphobic law that recently passed in North Carolina, making it illegal for people (trans or not) to use bathrooms that don’t correspond with their birth-given sex. But with sites like xHamster taking matters into their own hands, it’s interesting to consider how businesses might do their own part to combat discriminatory legislation.
In a statement provided to Broadly, xHamster explained that as marketers in sexuality-related content, they believe in the rights of all people, regardless of who they love or who they are, including members of the LGBT community. “Naturally, we are not aimed at banning the access to xHamster in North Carolinians forever,” the company said. “We blacked out the access to our website because we wanted to draw the attention of millions of people to patterns of human rights violations, and we are glad that our voice has been heard across the globe.”
In the New York Times, Wesley Morris wants to know what is the right way to do a superhero movie in 2016, and what’s the wrong way.
In the current film climate, viewers are inundated with superhero movies. Commonly proving themselves to be the most lucrative franchises coming from any production company, it’s no surprise that release schedules are set far in advance — and that other non-superhero movies are conveniently situated around them. But with so many coming so quickly, one has to wonder: what is the right formula for the perfect superhero movie?
But nothing is laughing harder or louder or more obnoxiously at the state of the superhero movie than Deadpool. It is nothingness. It believes in violence, but that’s about all it believes in: slashing and stabbing and shooting and — with Mr. Reynolds splashing figurative vinegar in the title role — sarcasm. And the nihilism is not without its charms.
On Dazed, Dominique Sisley reports on a new show presented by Art Responders, an art collective focusing on the production of art that responds directly to ongoing instances of police brutality in the US.
Daryl Wells founded Art Responders after getting in touch with other creatives through social media that were also making art that dealt with police brutality. Now, the collective is presenting their first real show in Los Angeles, titled VIRAL: 25 Years Since Rodney King.
“When I saw pictures of Mike Brown laid out in the sun for four hours, it provoked something in me,” she remembers. “Not just his death, but the thought of his family seeing his body carelessly left out in the hot sun for hours like that reminded me about [my brother] Paul, who I’d imagined sitting in a morgue refrigerator for months while we went about our business in the US, oblivious.”