In the final issue of our forty-fourth volume, the Nass interrogates the illusion of control in the beauty ideal, attempts to translate a scandalous conversation, and cracks open the meanings of “fault.”
To telescope, we begin with 300 words, then slice the word count in half for each successive section. We stop when the numbers stop dividing evenly. This week, eight Nass writers telescope the word “fault.”
“The dialogue below [..] is one of those instances in which my participation was peripheral, but the conversation was still exhilarating, confusing, and verging on scandalous.”
“I’d like to think that through educating myself on the topic of the beauty myth, I’ve naturally come closer to adopting a body neutrality mentality; after all, it’s hard to want to play a game that you know is rigged.”
“For Sontag, photography gives the amateur tourist photographer a sense of control— but superficial control. Knowledge— but superficial knowledge. In an unfamiliar, foreign environment the camera offers the illusive feeling of possession and command, in a very real sense empowering the photographer to take something of the place with them as their own.”
“At first, there is devastation; then, denial; then, anguish; then, acceptance and understanding of the bright side of life: after all, this was the gold medal game—and a silver medal at the most well-attended college curling event in the country is nothing to sneeze at.”