unfridged

• Mary Beard takes a fascinating look at the silencing of women in public spheres, starting with The Odyssey, and ending with internet trolls and the heckling of women politicians. [London Review of Books]
• Bitch just released their newest issue, and have made some of the pieces available. One, “Black to the Future” discusses the history and current state of afrofuturism as a “way to project blackness into the future—not merely as existing, but as a critical and significant part of it.” Meanwhile, “Mapping the Margins of Middle Earth” explores how the magnitude of the Lord of the Rings franchise has eclipsed New Zealand’s own political history.
• Have you played Gone Home yet? Me neither, but I so desperately want to. (Hey there free time, where’d you get to?) The Border House has a quick little review of it that covers the basics.
• The Mary Sue has a recurring series on the costumes and designs of comic book superheroes. This time, they take on the various iterations of Captain Marvel. (Monica Rambeau!)
• I don’t watch Arrow, but apparently there is now a queer character and Autostraddle is freaking out about it.
• Five common arguments against having female characters in video games, and their thorough, eloquent takedowns. [The Guardian]
• Jill Filipovic has been criminally mistreated on the internet for years, as her piece, “Let’s be real: online harassment isn’t ‘virtual’ for women,” shows. [Talking Points Memo]
• Before Ronald McNair was an astronaut, he was a little nine-year-old boy who wanted to check books out of the (segregated) library. This animated anecdote, courtesy of his brother, is adorable.
• More videos! Bill Nye talks about bow ties, and I melt into a happy puddle on the floor.
• Game/Show takes on the definition of “gamer,” and its problems.
• A charming deleted scene from Frozen shows the Elsa and Anna interacting in a typically sisterly way.

Top image: “Alchemic Emprise,” Joshua Mays.