My ex is demanding that I admit to raping him and threatening to post it on my Facebook wall
I was hanging out with a guy who is in a relationship. I told him nothing could happen, and we decided to keep things friendly. A while ago, I made the drunken mistake of climbing into the backseat of a car with him, and things got racy pretty quickly. He asked if I was on birth control; I told him yes, because I was, and he penetrated me and came inside me after one thrust.
The next day, I got all emotional, and he’s since stopped talking to me because I freaked. Here we are a bit later, and I just had a pregnancy scare. Had I been pregnant, I would have had an abortion. If I’d actually been facing an abortion, I would have called and told him. Would that have been the right thing to do?
I wouldn’t have asked for money or support; I would have told him solely because it would have felt wrong not to. I had some feeling, like he should know—because he has a right to know, you know? I can’t imagine I’m the only woman who’s been faced with a “to tell or not to tell” situation. Weigh in?
Classy Lady
11 May 2011
The Cock Falls, May It Rise Again
The Cock Tavern Theatre has closed following Brent council declaring that the stairs leading up to the theatre space fail to meet fire regulation standards. Also, the seats make your bum numb, but that was probably a distant second in the council’s mind. The stairs were too short and deep for safe use and the Cock would have had to completely rebuild them. Even for a funded theatre company this would have been a blow, but for an unfunded one like the Cock, it just isn’t worth it. They have therefore abandoned the venue and are looking for another.
The Cock’s press officer, Nathan Godkin, has told Snipe that much of the season’s programme has already been relocated. A Butcher of Distinction by Rob Hayes, nominated for three Offie awards (Best New Play, Best New Playwright and Best Actor for Sam Swann) will now be at The Kings Head Theatre. Tennessee William’s semi-lost play A Cavalier for Milady will move to the Jermyn Street Theatre.
This is turning into a mini-epidemic, with Above The Stag Theatre also looking for a new home. Maybe the Stag and the Cock can get something going together. Hopefully they will both find new homes soon, as even somewhere as culturally rich as London needs every creative venue it can get.
11 Apr 2011
Live Weekends: Shunt
ICA are hosting Shunt’s Live Weekends from 23-27 March of plays, music, films, art, workshops, stuffed pheasants that yodel from beyond the grave and an opportunity to take a five minute nap while somebody sings you lullabies. There’s also a semi-permanent tattoo parlour in operation, in case you really want to get your true love’s name stenciled across your heart, but don’t want it to necessarily still be there when you find another true love.
The entire event is free, just turn up and wander the programme until you find several things to spark your brain, then command your feet to go there.
21 Feb 2011
Exit, Stag Left
Above the Stag Theatre, situated, reasonably enough, above The Stag pub just off Victoria Station has been given a brief reprieve. Plans for the redevelopment of Bressenden Place apparently don’t include the pub, and artistic director Peter Bull was given notice to leave three weeks ago, effectively ending the season. Can’t do much theatre on a work site, where your only audience is going to be sweaty, buff construction workers in filthy jeans and no T shirts jiggling with jackhammers or sashaying about in slow motion carrying their enormous tool kits.
The stay of execution allows ATS to mount their production of My Beautiful Laundrette in March, and a new musical by Taggart writer Glenn Chandler called Cleveland Street. Then the rainbow beflagged company will have to find a new home. In all honesty, this might be a good thing. Bull did the best he could, but it is a difficult space. A narrow lane of a stage, a catwalk really, looks more suitable for small fashion show or an even smaller bowling alley. Hopefully they’ll find somewhere new soon. It won’t be easy, if a likely prerequisite is that it needs to be above a gay/lesbian bar. However, there are several homosexuals in the theatre industry and with barely a smidge of luck somebody is bound to put forward a cool venue that only needs an playhouse upstairs to be the perfect place to pop in, grab a date and have a ready-made night out.
12 Feb 2011
London agenda for Friday 14 January
1. Catch up on the story of 21st century art with the gritty, psychogeographic tableaux of Gilbert and George [Le Cool]
2. Wonder how subversive the social uselessness of art is at Art: what is the use? [Run Riot]
3. Infiltrate the Stafford’s Wine Cellars [Tired of London]
4. See one of the best shows at the Fringe this year and almost certainly the best show about naval frigates with Jonny Sweet [Spoonfed]
5. Take in in an incredible exhibition of over one hundred photographs that display the stunning nature of the countryside at Take a View: Landscape Photographer of the Year 2010 [Lauren Down]
7. Watch the shorts that were submitted, but not accepted at the London Short Film Festival at Salon de Refuges Here’s Snipe’s review of an earlier event.
14 Jan 2011
Huckleberry Finn, edited for hipsters
So there has been all sorts of to-and-fro over the decision of NewSouth Books to publish an edition of the long-in-public domain work Adventures of Huckleberry Finn with the word nigger replaced by the word slave.
Thankfully, law on public domain allows for other publishers to create their own specialised editions as Brooklyn publisher Dumbo has done with the Hipster Huckleberry Finn. Every instance of nigger has been replaced by hipster, resulting a thoroughly up-to-date book that can be taught in classrooms from Dalston to Williamsburg to Strathcona.
Here’s a sample paragraph:
So the next day after the funeral, along about , the girls’ joy got the first jolt. A couple of hipster traders come along, and the king sold them the hipsters reasonable, for three—day drafts as they called it, and away they went, the two sons up the river to Memphis, and their mother down the river to Orleans. I thought them poor girls and them hipsters would break their hearts for grief; they cried around each other, and took on so it most made me down sick to see it. The girls said they hadn’t ever dreamed of seeing the family separated or sold away from the town. I can’t ever get it out of my memory, the sight of them poor miserable girls and hipsters hanging around each other’s necks and crying; and I reckon I couldn’t a stood it all, but would a had to bust out and tell on our gang if I hadn’t knowed the sale warn’t no account and the hipsters would be back home in a week or two.
You can purchase it here for £12.57 or just download the PDF for free.
13 Jan 2011
Big Brother's Kenneth Tong gives mega creepy interview
Fans of Big Brother may remember rich boy Kenneth Tong, boyfriend of housemate Karly, who was added to the show minutes before she was voted out. The one who was warned by BB producers that telling another housemate, Bea, he could “pay someone to deal with [her]” could be construed as threatening. That guy.
13 Jan 2011
Killer cover: crosshairs through US history
Seattle’s alternative weekly newspaper, The Stranger, is publishing the above image as their cover today.
(Cover by Dan Savage and Aaron Huffman. Yes, the same Dan Savage who is our agony uncle —he moonlights as the Stranger’s editorial director.)
13 Jan 2011
London agenda for Thursday 13 January
1. Watch the fabulous doc, Battle for Barking, which gives an insider’s view into the warring campaign groups of Labour incumbent Margaret Hodge and controversial BNP leader Nick Griffin, as they struggle for the hearts and minds of Barking’s constituents. At the Frontline [Le Cool]
2. Join Dr. Spooner as she talks about Gothic, Steampunk & neo-Victorian styles in Japanese & western fashion, & immerse yourself in an eve of entertainment with Steampunk impresarios White Mischief [Run Riot]
3. Feel like meeting The Velvet Underground and The Jesus & Mary Chain on a very dark night, after a late supper of magic mushrooms with HP Sauce at Suicide Party [London Gigs]
4. Discover barely concealed venom behind superb, almost rockabilly rhythms at Seven Souls + Brown Brogues + Milk Maid [Spoonfed]
5. Travel to the future at the University of the Arts London grad show [Spoonfed]
6. Remember the 20th century Martyrs [Tired of London]
13 Jan 2011
London agenda for Wednesday 12 January
1. Can I borrow a feeling? Little tiny aprons at the Founding Museum [Le Cool]
2. Say ‘I Do’ to Branchage Proposes Marriage [Run Riot]
3. Drink at the Windsor Castle, Marylebone [Tired of London]
12 Jan 2011
Snipe Highlights
Some popular articles from past years
- Diary of the shy Londoner
- Nice map of London's fruit trees shows you where to pick free food
- Margaret Thatcher statue rejected by public
- An interview with Desiree Akhavan
- Only 16 commuters touch in to Emirates Air Line, figures reveal
- A unique collection of photos of Edwardian Londoners
- Hope and despair in Woolwich town centre
- Summer Camp: Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days
- Punk brewery just as sexist and homophobic as the industry they rail against
- Peter Bayley has worked for 50 years as a cinema projectionist in East Finchley
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