Noah Berlatsky

Art without politics actually results in a sweeping Puritanism. For art to have power, it needs to engage with power, with politics.

Irritation is the way of all flesh. The question is, if you're going to be annoyed for all of eternity, who do you want to be doing the annoying?

It's worth questioning some of our assumptions about adolescent inferiority.

Hating sex workers—and treating them as things—can get you money.

Talking about race can get you into a lot of trouble . . . especially if you don't have a lot of class power or status.

The history of pop music, and of black pop music in particular, has always been gay history.

Fifth Harmony is nobody's idea of a roots band.

Bulimia.com has reworked superhero images to show more realistic body types—and their efforts are valuable in more than the expected ways.

Action movies don't usually bother much with romance. The trailer for The Transporter: Refueled certainly doesn't. The hero is cool — sexy women, plural, throw themselves at him, or at least stand near him and things blow up; there are fights and revenge and high production values. Romance is, at best, a secondary concern.

Female masturbation is sexy in part because it flirts with lesbianism. For male masturbation, it's a different story.