This morning my daughter, who is nearly four, saw the stretch marks on my hips and stomach. She ran her hands over them and asked what they were.
“I got them when I grew up,” I said, “and a few more when I had you.” I grinned down at her. “They’re my stripes. You’ll get stripes too when you grow up.”
She was overjoyed. “Really?”
I think she’s in her room now, pretending to be a tiger.
This is what we need to teach.
Showing posts tagged Feminism
Somewhere It Hides a Well...: More on male gaze, women's bodies (I swear this is the last one! I'm probaly lying though)
And also there’s the pretty ugh, horrible way that the whole “well, obviously she wants someone to look” attitude applies, in practice, to women’s very bodies, and not just to their clothes.
The way this (generally, male) assumption that anyone who looks attractive to you must therefore be trying to attract you, leads to the idea that therefore it must be OK to target the person with sexual attention no matter what she says, becomes even fucking creepier than it already damn well was, when the locus for “attractiveness” in question is the woman’s very physical being.
Like, I know a lot of us have had the experience of being plagued by street harassment from a very young age. And then, well, I teach, and honestly most all of the girls have developed or started developing at least by the time they get to middle school at like, 13 years old or whatever. So yeah, children get subjected to this shit, because basically, “well, if she didn’t want people to look, why did she grow breasts?”
Among adult women of course, the assumptions get made based on other things like breast size. I’m lucky in being marvelously flat-chested, but I have heard unpleasant things from my more well endowed friends about the disproportionate amount of crap / sexualization they have to put up with.
That whole thing bleeds over into the ostracization of breastfeeding women from public areas on the grounds that there is something inappropriate about feeding your baby in public. The logic again goes, “Because boobs look sexy to me, therefore boobs are for teh sexy,” and the the male gaze is thereby privileged as the only one that matters in determining policy**.
(**An aspect which applies to the entire issue as a whole, whereby individuals who aren’t heterosexual males are not even considered as possible entities from whom these women could be seeking attention of any kind.)
And, obviously, a lot of times this has a racialized component when it comes to “exotic” (ugh) women of any color, who are automatically seen as more sexualized and sexually available just because of their race.
To me, the bodily aspect really highlights exactly what is just so fucked up about this attitude that “you can just tell” or the idea that people are justified in targeting people with unwanted sexual attention, based on nothing but their personal perceptions of a womans intentions vis-a-vis her appearance.
Woman Photographs Herself Receiving Strange Looks in Public
“I now reverse the gaze and record their reactions to me while I perform mundane tasks in public spaces. I seek out spaces that are visually interesting and geographically diverse. I try to place myself in compositions that contain feminine icons or advertisements. Otherwise, I position myself and the camera in a pool of people…and wait.
The images capture the gazer in a microsecond moment where they, for unknowable reasons, have a look on their face that questions my presence. Whether they are questioning my position in front of the lens or questioning my body size, the gazer appears to be visually troubled that I am in front of them.”
Photographer: Haley Morris-Cafiero
Project: Wait Watchers
Thought this was actually really cool and I’d share it with you guys! Takes a lot to get up there and do something like this. Love it!
this is such a fucking important project to me because i am constantly stared at in public in a negative way and turned into some disgusting object for the amusement of others and this is a peaceful way to confront those people
turning the spectators into the spectacle
why are people so shitty
![siuilaruin:
feministbecky:
theshellofvenus:
Read for free here:
http://ressourcesfeministes.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/pornland-introduction.pdf
http://ressourcesfeministes.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/pornland-part-2.pdf
http://ressourcesfeministes.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/pornland-part-3.pdf
I saw her presentation on this… god, damn.
I saw her presentation on this, and I also said “god damn”, but not for a good reason.
She was racist, classist, heterosexist, simultaneously demonized AND romanticized sex workers, kink-shamed, slut-shamed, and was just plain fucking RUDE to people who were trying to have a legitimate discussion with her about intersectionality.
There was an older Black woman (who i think was a professor at my college) and a Native Hawaiian student trying to talk to her about the ignored racial intersections within her presentation and book, and she continually ignored them or “whitesplained” whatever they were trying to say. I was also trying to speak to her about the implications porn had for queer relationships, because a big thing she did wa compare domestic abuse rates and porn viewing, and she just ignored me and refused to answer. At one point during the “discussion segment” she looked me straight in the eye and told me to “shut up about things you know nothing about” when I was asking her about whether she even considered the fact that many women enjoy porn, and that MANY people enjoy BDSM.
I just laughed in her face and was like
“Lady, I watch porn at LEAST 3 times a week, if not more. And I am not the only one in this room. But women watching porn is not the problem here, the problem is that you have completely ignored class structures, racial pressures, and non-heterosexual influences on the porn industry, and are refusing to listen to anyone who brings up something other than your romanticized ‘broken and abused porn stars’.”
[At that point I was not very honest with myself about my BDSM interests, so I didn’t say anything about that, but ooooh was I mad.]
Lets just say I was NOT impressed at ALL. For all the hullabaloo that the “feminist community” made about this book, I soon realized it was the WHITE feminist community. This is just another book by another middle class white feminist who completely ignores intersectionality and demonizes sex workers.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/aa7d0c693c7c162932343f5ce645b4e9/tumblr_mlfzkbZy861rvoyk3o1_250.jpg)
Read for free here:
http://ressourcesfeministes.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/pornland-introduction.pdf
http://ressourcesfeministes.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/pornland-part-2.pdf
http://ressourcesfeministes.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/pornland-part-3.pdf
I saw her presentation on this… god, damn.
I saw her presentation on this, and I also said “god damn”, but not for a good reason.
She was racist, classist, heterosexist, simultaneously demonized AND romanticized sex workers, kink-shamed, slut-shamed, and was just plain fucking RUDE to people who were trying to have a legitimate discussion with her about intersectionality.
There was an older Black woman (who i think was a professor at my college) and a Native Hawaiian student trying to talk to her about the ignored racial intersections within her presentation and book, and she continually ignored them or “whitesplained” whatever they were trying to say. I was also trying to speak to her about the implications porn had for queer relationships, because a big thing she did wa compare domestic abuse rates and porn viewing, and she just ignored me and refused to answer. At one point during the “discussion segment” she looked me straight in the eye and told me to “shut up about things you know nothing about” when I was asking her about whether she even considered the fact that many women enjoy porn, and that MANY people enjoy BDSM.
I just laughed in her face and was like
“Lady, I watch porn at LEAST 3 times a week, if not more. And I am not the only one in this room. But women watching porn is not the problem here, the problem is that you have completely ignored class structures, racial pressures, and non-heterosexual influences on the porn industry, and are refusing to listen to anyone who brings up something other than your romanticized ‘broken and abused porn stars’.”
[At that point I was not very honest with myself about my BDSM interests, so I didn’t say anything about that, but ooooh was I mad.]
Lets just say I was NOT impressed at ALL. For all the hullabaloo that the “feminist community” made about this book, I soon realized it was the WHITE feminist community. This is just another book by another middle class white feminist who completely ignores intersectionality and demonizes sex workers.
She Thinks Too Much [Such Girls Are Dangerous]: spicyobsession: white feminists and white “critical” fangirls can...
white feminists and white “critical” fangirls can boohoo all they want about how they’d like their female characters to exist as more than a love interest or have romances downplayed in their character arcs
I’ll sit over here in my intersectional corner wishing and hoping for WoC characters with romance-heavy arcs because really, how often do you see that in media
how often do you see us romanced and cherished without it being made into a fetish or a temporary fuck before we get thrown over for the ultimate end-game white love interest
I once had a guy (ex-boyfriend) tell me that girls aren’t allowed to be engineers. My sister is an engineer.
(submitted by anonymous)
PEGGY SEEGER “I’m Gonna Be An Engineer”
When I was a little girl I wished I was a boy
I tagged along behind the gang and wore my corduroys.
Everybody said I only did it to annoy
But I was gonna be an engineer.
Mamma said, “Why can’t you be a lady?
Your duty is to make me the mother of a pearl
Wait until you’re older, dear
And maybe you’ll be glad that you’re a girl.
Dainty as a Dresden statue, gentle as a Jersey cow,
Smooth as silk, gives cream and milk
Learn to coo, learn to moo
That’s what you do to be a lady, now.
When I went to school I learned to write and how to read
History, geography and home economy
And typing is a skill that every girl is sure to need
To while away the extra time until the time to breed
And then they had the nerve to ask, what would I like to be?
I says, “I’m gonna be an engineer!”
“No, you only need to learn to be a lady
The duty isn’t yours, for to try to run the world
An engineer could never have a baby
Remember, dear, that you’re a girl”
She’s smart - for a woman.
I wonder how she got that way?
You get no choice, you get no voice
Just stay mum, pretend you’re dumb.
That’s how you come to be a lady, today.
Well, I started as a typist but I studied on the sly
Working out the day and night so I could qualify
And every time the boss came in, he pinched me on the thigh
Said, “I’ve never had an engineer!”
“You owe it to the job to be a lady
The duty of the staff is to give the boss a whirl
The wages that you get are crummy, maybe
But it’s all you get, ‘cause you’re a girl”
Then Jimmy came along and we set up a conjugation
We were busy every night with loving recreation
I spent my days at work so he could get an education
And now he’s an engineer!
He said: “I know you’ll always be a lady
The duty of my darling is to love me all her life
Could an engineer look after or obey me?
Remember, dear, that you’re my wife!”
As soon a Jimmy got a job, I studied hard again
Then busy at me turret-lathe a year or two, and then
The morning that the twins were born, Jimmy says to them
“Your mother was an engineer!”
“You owe it to the kids to be a lady
Dainty as a dish-rag, faithful as a chow
Stay at home, you got to mind the baby
Remember you’re a mother now!”
Every time I turn around there’s something else to do
Cook a meal or mend a sock or sweep a floor or two
Listening to Jimmy Young - it makes me want to spew
I was gonna be an engineer.
I only wish that I could be a lady
I’d do the lovely things that a lady’s s’posed to do
I wouldn’t even mind if only they would pay me
Then I could be a person too.
What price for a woman?
You can buy her for a ring of gold,
To love and obey, without any pay,
You get a cook and a nurse for better or worse
You don’t need a purse when a lady is sold.
Oh, but now the times are harder and me Jimmy’s got the sack;
I went down to Vicker’s, they were glad to have me back.
But I’m a third-class citizen, my wages tell me that
But I’m a first-class engineer!
The boss he says “We pay you as a lady,
You only got the job because I can’t afford a man,
With you I keep the profits high as may be,
You’re just a cheaper pair of hands.”
You got one fault, you’re a woman;
You’re not worth the equal pay.
A bitch or a tart, you’re nothing but heart,
Shallow and vain, you’ve got no brain,
Well, I listened to my mother and I joined a typing pool
Listened to my lover and I put him through his school
If I listen to the boss, I’m just a bloody fool
And an underpaid engineer
I been a sucker ever since I was a baby
As a daughter, as a mother, as a lover, as a dear
But I’ll fight them as a woman, not a lady
I’ll fight them as an engineer!
“
(Reblogged from necoho)
White women and black men have it both ways. They can act as oppressor or be oppressed. Black men may be victimized by racism, but sexism allows them to act as exploiters and oppressors of women. White women may be victimized by sexism, but racism enabled them to act as exploiters and oppressors of black people. Both groups have led liberation movements that favor their interests and support the continued oppression of other groups. Black male sexism has undermined struggles to eradicate racism just as white female racism undermines feminist struggle. As long as these two groups or any group defines liberation as gaining social equality with ruling class white men, they have a vested interest in the continued exploitation and oppression of others.
bell hooks, Feminist Theory: From margin to center (via ceedling)
WERK BELL
(via bpfoeva88)
(Source: orindamoraga)
I once had an anon tell me in regards to this blog that maybe the problem was “the type of men you associate with.” Considering the range of ages, races, sexual orientations, occupations, etc, that submit to this blog, I can’t decided if I find the very suggestion laughable or astonishing.
powerpuff girls punching society’s ignorance in the balls
(Source: forever90s)
[TW Rape]
Once I had a guy tell me that rape was easy to prevent if I were only smart enough.
(submitted by anonymous)
Raise your hand if you’ve met that guy. Raise it twice if it was a teacher, boss, coworker, fellow student, or other person who you have to interact with on a regular basis.
“
(Reblogged from payslipgig)
Baum’s mother-in-law was none other than famous activist and suffragette Matilda Joslyn Gage. She was a frequent visitor at their house, as were many other suffragettes of the time, including Susan B. Anthony. Baum was not only sympathetic to their cause, but active towards it, serving as the secretary for Aberdeen Women’s Suffrage Club, and writing editorials for the “Aberdeen Saturday Pioneer,” urging citizens to vote for women’s suffrage. The revolt of Jinjur in “The Marvelous World of Oz” is an allusion to the women’s movement, and it’s said that the gutsy character of Dorothy was inspired by Matilda, though one can easily see a bit of feisty Maud in her, too.
Though Baum brushed off claims that Oz was at all political, he made a decided choice to make women front and center of the series. They’re princesses, ordinary farmgirls, witches (both good and bad), rag dolls, generals, pastry chefs, and problem-solving faeries. They have adventures, lead search parties, rescue one another, solve difficulties, and challenge the Nome King in combat. Perhaps most significantly, none of the characters -– not Ozma, Glinda, Betsy or Dorothy –- ever engage in romantic relationships. Baum made a point of avoiding such trappings as love interests, because he believed children would find passionate romance boring, and an emotional element which they wouldn’t truly understand. Perhaps there was a personal element in this as well, as Baum, conscious of what Maud sacrificed in order to marry him, allowed his heroines perpetual youth and personal freedom.
I once had a guy tell me it was harder to be a straight white middle class male than any other social group. He was dead serious.
(submitted by one-way-down)
