Dear Austin People

If you live here or might happen to be here Sunday, I just discovered today that the Handmade Nation documentary by Faythe Levine is playing at the South Lamar Drafthouse this Sunday. Jeff and I will be heading out to the 4:10 showing, and I invite you to go with me!  Just let me know

Along with the two screenings (1:30 and 4:10) there’s a Q&A with Faythe Levine after the screenings, a Craft Bazaar from noon to 6 pm, and somebody sent me a notice about an after-screening party at Austin Handmade t 6:30. I’m mostly in it for the screening, but I never could resist a craft bazaar.

Anyway, you can see more info about it at Sublime Stitching and they have a list of vendors.

P. S. This is like the craft-nerd version of going to the opening night of a Star Trek movie if you’re a Trekkie.  Geeks getting together and yelling at the screen and stuff, laughing at the jokes from Season 4, Episode 5.  Not that I would know something like that about such a nerdy exercise in movie fandom.

Gosh I love Controversy

As a highly opinionated person, I do love a bit of controversy, and I can be quite argumentative. And my most fiercely held opinion is that everyone has the right to their own opinion.

I’ve argued with a lot of people in my life and what I’ve found is that many people believe I argue because I want them to agree with me. I don’t. I want people to think. I want folks to explore what they believe, and to challenge themselves and me. I want people to have opinions and support them. I want people to convince me of things, and to be convinced of things by me. Or maybe just to have a good discussion that results in nobody changing their minds at all.

I don’t believe that because I think something, the person who things differently about it is necessarily wrong. Probably no one is wrong. I can’t decide for someone else what’s right or wrong for them, and it’s never a good idea for others to try to decide that for me. I simply won’t have it. And feel free to disagree with everything I’ve just said.

With that said, I recently read a post that stirred up discussion, so in celebration of crafting controversy everywhere, I present to you some of my favorite posts. I recommend reading the comments as well as the post.

1.  Political agendas: the Etsy Craftivism team on Crafting a Green World.  There was a flap on political leanings within the ranks.  Do you have to be leftist to want to effect change? It seems sometimes the assumption is “yes.”

2.  Also from Crafting a Green World, Julie gets called “retarded” (definitely poor word choice) in the comments in reply to her post about using acrylic felt.  As an acrylic felt (and yarn) user myself, I thought the response was in remarkably poor taste, but everyone’s got an opinion.  Just maybe insulting others isn’t the best way to voice your response.

3.  The post that gave me the idea, the Stitch Bitch’s post on the DIY craft youth movement and its portrayal.  And of course, Anna wrote a well-crafted response post as well giving due consideration to the comments she received originally.

4.  OMG, the Craftzine dared to post … Squirrel Feet earrings!  Creative taxidermy turned out to be very controversial. It incited something of an online riot.

5.  Although I’ve drawn out the squirrel discussion in particular since it got people so riled up, Craft in fact noted a whole list of 2008 controversial posts.  Never say people don’t have opinions.

6.  Margaux Lange, creator of Barbie-inspired jewelry, who posted on her negative experience at a craft show in DC. It’s a long and detailed accounting.  I responded, and I realize now it’s overly long, I forgot I had so much to say about it.  I was very disappointed in the craft show attendees, and apparently other things as well.

7.  Remember the CPSIA flap over new childrens’ products testing and the impact on small business owners?  Etsy got really involved, and got the attention of the Consumer Product Safety Commission. I still have a button on my site which I mean to take down ANY day now.

8. Speaking of blog maintenance – I’m kinda sad she edited it from the first, glorious rant, but the point is still there on Urban Craft’s blog post No One Reads Blogs Anymore. You can get a better idea of her original post from the 60 comments. The point is: what’s the etiquette of craft blog posting? Is it really interesting to post about our dinner-making, children and other non-craft pursuits? Do we really read each others’ posts or just skim?  Do we take care of our blog links, etc.?  Very interesting, and worth a read if you write a craft blog.

Those are the ones I’ve noted and remembered, but I would be really thrilled and pleased if any of you know of any more rants, discussions, arguments, or controversies and can post them in the comments.  I do love reading them.

There are currently 50-some people subscribed to this blog, which is amazing to me, but I rarely hear from any of you!  So I am hoping at least ONE of you manages to actually stop by! And if you’re the owner of one of the flaps mentioned, I’d like to hear what your response was when you realized you’d incited comment

CPSIA + Handmade

Many of you probably have heard about this, but in case you haven’t, there’s a debate going on about the impact of the new Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act on small businesses.  It is scheduled to go into effect February 9.

The Act was intended to address toy quality concerns after the recall of toys from China that contained toxic substances.  It’s important to note that the new requirements introduced by the Act are designed to target the quality control of large-scale manufacturing concerns.  That’s great, but what isn’t is that the new rules and testing standards also affect small producers of toys and clothing.    Sellers who produce handmade or small production items for children are finding themselves in a quandary:  they, too, have to prove their items are free of toxins X, Y and Z, a process often costing thousands of dollars that they can’t afford for products that were never in danger of being toxic.

It’s an interesting dilemma – no one wants children to be poisoned, but we should still be able to somehow have a market doesn’t stifle small producers through inappropriately targeted legislation.  For more, you can visit the Handmade Toy Alliance, or visit Cool Mom Pick which is doing the Save Handmade button campaign (the button I posted here) and has actions to take and resources, or read this Open Letter from Etsy, or this article from the Craft Zine,