I'm a FEMINIST

My name is Colleen, and I'm a feminist.

I'm a college student. I'm a bibliophile. I have wavy brown hair and brown eyes. I like to wear cardigans. I work five jobs. I play the ukulele. I'm going to England next year. I like to paint my nails pretty colors. I'm a National Merit Scholar. I'm a photographer. I want to be a teacher. And I'm a feminist.

I'm a feminist because:

Gender inequality hurts everyone. For every girl tortured by femininity, there is a boy trapped by masculinity.

I want ALL people to be free, equal, educated, and happy about their lives, their jobs, and whom they love.

My bachelor's degree will earn me the same pay as a man with a high school degree.

Around the world, sex is used as a tool of power.

Women work 2/3 of the world's hours, yet earn 10 percent of its income and own 1 percent of its property.


Happy International Women's Day and Feminist Coming Out Day, y'all!

Sleepless and earnest in New York: An insomniac's ode to feminism

So it's 5:10 in the morning, and I haven't slept at all. I blame this on my crazy midterms sleep schedule, my body readjusting to the sounds of the city at night, and my inexhaustible brain (it is a lonely brain at 5:10 in the morning! Everything is dark and quiet, so naturally it just wants to chat about the work I have to do over break, the exams I will have when I return to school, sendoff, shock your mom, what I'm going to do this summer, the application I have to write, how my friends are doing, how everyone in my family is doing, and how strange the rest of my room looks at 5:30 in the morning. Was that something moving in the corner?) Needless to say, I'm writing a lengthy (unless I fall asleep) blog post about why I'm a feminist, what feminism means to me, and why it is important for me to publicly identify as a feminist. I'm writing about my feminism today because it is officially Feminist Coming Out Day, the thought-baby of a queer student group and a feminist club at Harvard; the two groups got together to raise awareness at school, and they've teamed up with Bitch Magazine to take the campaign nationwide.

I love the idea of being able to put faces (hopefully a diverse, wide-reaching range of faces) to feminism. I think a lot about how to make feminism (any and every kind of feminism) accessible to everyone as a personal identity, a creed that informs political views, a mode of self-help, a comfort, and a way to connect. I exist in a very privileged and progressive sphere, in that I am from New York City, that I go to Kenyon, and that the people I surround myself with/classes I take/activities I help organize or participate in at Kenyon are all relatively aligned with my politics and my worldview. It's really easy to forget that the face of feminism for the majority isn't nearly as young, fresh, witty, snarky, and inspiring as my feminist role models are. Instead, when feminism isn't demonized by right wing politicians, it is dusty, old, and even "dead." So it's really exciting to see a ton of young (and not so young...here's my mom's new photo, pictured with my grandma) facebook users from all over the country, feminists who aren't simply cis, straight, rich, white females. It's exciting to see my newsfeed blow up with friends changing their profile pictures to claim their feminism (it's exciting to be reminded that I have so many awesome feminist friends, and to be pleasantly surprised by friends I've never gone near the topic of feminism around "coming out" via facebook). And it always feels really good to see facebook being used to further issues I care about and to bring people together in an organic, authentic way; I think facebook and the proliferation of other types of social media has the potential to be really destructive (concerning, among many other things, rigid gender constructs), so I love when it is used in a wonderful way.

Now it's six in the morning. Prime time for feminist sap. I grew up with feminism - my grandma started the "Women's Project" in family therapy and wrote a book about how to raise sons without imposing society's strict, limiting, and often damaging normative masculinity on them. She was a housewife during that period when every white middle-class woman in America was a housewife. One day she decided that she was profoundly dissatisfied, and that she was going to go back to school at 40 years old with three children to raise on the side. She raised three hippies, one of whom became my hippie-dippie mother, who ran women's consciousness raising groups in San Francisco during the 70's and threw me a ceremonial party when I got my period for the first time (during which all of her hippie-dippie friends gave me gifts like herb filled heating pads, special pens to write poems and thoughts with, and womanlove scented candles). But none of my friends in high school talked about feminism, and I don't think I claimed feminism as my own movement until I got to Kenyon and met my remarkably outspoken new roommate (or soulmate) Katie. It wasn't until I had someone my age to talk about feminism with that it ceased to be something I associated with the matriarchal tradition in my family, and became something i associated with this exciting period of my life - with my youth, my idealistic politics (my youth), and my sense of self as a grown, autonomous person in the world. Feminism began to inform and transform everything about my life; it had always been there before, but now I was consciously putting it into practice. I was treating myself and my peers differently, I was treating my body differently, I was devouring feminist blogs and literature, I was discovering my sexuality as a beautiful, delicious thing, I was learning, learning, learning. I "came out" to Kenyon via allstu during the second semester of my first year at college. It was the practice of putting all this into words (albeit much fewer words) and putting these words on display, that really forced me to acknowledge how central, vital, and irreplaceable feminism is in my life. And it is the practice of publicly claiming feminism again and again (especially at 6:30 in the morning!) that keeps me enlivened, outraged, connected, and grateful. So so so so grateful.

My beef with "Keep Your Laws Off My Body"

Real quick here, because I have to do SO MUCH HOMEWORK and I can post all kinds of exciting things about Walk for Choice Ohio LATER, when I am done with two tests and two papers.

Recently I saw, on the wide wide internet, a meme sort of thing. (I can't find it now, which makes this whole sentence rather anticlimactic.) Point is, it said at the top, "Keep your laws off my body!" and at the bottom, "Pay for my abortion."

Though I think the maker of this meme and I have rather different views about abortion, it struck a chord--why, after all, do a lot of pro-choice activists use the phrase "Keep Your Laws Off My Body" ? I appreciate the sentiment of the phrase because really the point of it is just that a bunch of rich white legislators shouldn't be allowed to make terrible, terrible decisions of women's health, that government doesn't have a place in our medical choices.

But I do want the government all up in my healthcare! OBVIOUSLY I don't want government to tell me what I can and can't do with my body or keep me from receiving important medical care. That. Should be. A GIVEN. (It isn't. But it should be.) I would, however, very much like for the government to provide ALL of its citizens with healthcare. I would like for the government to pour lots and lots and lots of taxpayer money into healthcare (and education, and not war, etc.).

"Keep Your Laws Off My Body" sends the wrong message there. I'd much prefer "Make Laws to Take Care of My Body!" There are a lot of laws and legislative whatnot that DO or WILL provide important medical care (or education, etc.) to a lot of people! And we like those laws! So let's not go stomping on all legislation, or all legislators; it's not all bad.

What a Nice Guy

"Look, college twat."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I was in a car with my best friend, her boyfriend, the boyfriend's roommate, and their friend, another student at the University of Pittsburgh's Honors College. We were on our way to a gay club on the other side of town. Their friend, sitting next to me in the backseat, said these words as he pointed out the window toward some women on the sidewalk.

I'd been hanging out with them for about four days, visiting my friend before I went back to Kenyon. As usual, I brushed off most things that they said. Karen had told them that I came to Pittsburgh from Feminist Winter Term and they seemed alternately frightened of offending me and delighting in attempts to find ways to offend me. (They hung their new Playboy calendar. I wasn't fazed.) I'm used to people not watching their language as closely as I do—so words like "bitch" and "slut" slipped out among various discussions that made me vaguely uncomfortable but not angry enough to interrupt conversation. (Note: The word "bitch" can be complicated. More on that another time.)

But now this—"twat"? I have plenty of arguments with friends at Kenyon over using "slut" and "whore" and "crazy bitch" to refer to women (and sometimes to men). But I've never heard anyone at Kenyon use this particular phrase. ("Cunt" I have heard plenty, but only in a reclaiming-it way, and/or to refer to the actual vagina rather than a person.)

I don't remember exactly what I said to the man who said this—something like "not okay."

His response was something to the effect of, "But they are." I told him that it's not a respectful way to refer to a woman.

"But they're all wearing these skanky clothes," he insisted, "They're just going to get drunk and have sex with random guys."

I bristled. "Then that's their prerogative!" I told him.

"And it's my prerogative to judge them for it."

"No. No it is not."

Conversation returned to normal. I wasn't blazing angry or anything, I kept laughing, kept talking. I was a little bothered by his hypocrisy--those girls were probably, like us, on their way to a club. Hell, I was wearing a pretty short little number...would he have called me that if he'd seen me walking around the campus? I was a little ticked, but I felt that this conversation was just one of many I'd already had with people who used words without quite knowing what they meant, or what they implied, or that people could be deeply offended by them. After all, this friend had been, in all other ways, a nice guy.

A nice guy. It hit me later that night, as I was shampooing the heavy scent of smoky bar out of my hair. I suddenly realized that there was a name for this person, and for so many people that I knew, and that name was: Nice Guy.

I frantically began to mentally compile the characteristics of Nice Guy, realizing with shock again and again just how many of them were in my life.

Nice Guys are usually far more appealing (for friendships or romantic love) than the Frat Boys and Pussy-Huntin' Bros we usually spend our time raging against. They're a little more informed, often academic. They may be less traditionally masculine—they roll their eyes at guys who spend hours on end in the gym or who chest-bump over Natty Lights—even if they enjoy playing sports or video games or other culturally dudely things. They like art, literature, and music. They embody the "bromance" when they are with other Nice Guys. (See: Turk and JD on Scrubs...actually, JD on Scrubs is a really excellent example of Nice Guy!). They support LGBTQ rights. They would never pressure a girl to do something she doesn't want to do. And in general: They respect women.

The only problem is that Nice Guys can disqualify people from their respect.

I am never one of those people. Maybe this is why I have so many friends I can identify as Nice Guys (or maybe they are a fairly large proportion of the liberal arts college population, which is probably true). But what always happens is this:

"But Colleen, you aren't like those girls [those sluts, ditzes, whores, bitches]. You're smart." You don't wear makeup, so you're, like, genuine. You don't show a lot of skin. You don't have sex with a lot of people. You're reserved. You don't drink every Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday night.

And that is why you earn my respect.

The term "benevolent sexism" comes to mind, and while I don't think the Benevolent Sexist and the Nice Guy are one and the same, they have a lot of similarities—they're men who like women, who value them. The Benevolent Sexist wants to protect a woman, to save a damsel in distress, to always pay for a date. The Nice Guy is interested in that too, of course, because he's Nice, but if a woman dares to have sex with a lot of men she's not in relationships with and doesn't care who knows it? Whoa boy, the Nice Guy thinks she's not a lady he wants to pay for dates with any more.

I don't necessarily like all guys, or all girls, but I try for respect, or at least tolerance. I'm not a huge fan of men who participate in hyper-masculine frat culture (not all men who do so, but there are specific groups of men at least at Kenyon I'd rather not hang out with, and that's okay) so I don't expect guys to be huge fans of girls who participate in hyper-feminine sorority culture if that's just not their cup of tea. But you've got to find other reasons to dislike people than "she's wearing a short skirt."

And if you don't like it? Keep it to yourself. Would you use the word "twat" to describe your sister?

Feminist Winter Term: What do you do with a BA in...

I'm not used to being the only English major in the room.

Okay, well, I wasn't. Molly is too, and there were some others at Feminist Winter Term. But most people were women's and gender studies majors (or minors, double majors, concentrators, etc.).

I'm sure a lot of them were comforted by the many successful activists we met who all said, "Yeah, I majored in Women's Studies. Now I have a swanky office, and you can do it too!"

Much of FWT focused on the path to activism, feminist careers, and networking, and we even had a whole day set aside for career-building. In the morning we went to the Ms. Foundation for a career panel, and in the afternoon we went to our half-day internships.

The Ms. panel was interesting because it was so realistic. We were encouraged to be go-getters, professionals with clean, tame Facebook profiles and memberships on LinkedIn (which, yes, I have now joined). We got advice on writing cover letters, contacting potential employers, interviews, and resumes.

Molly and I found this informative, but not quite as relevant--we're only sophomores. Which isn't to say that we shouldn't be thinking about The Future (true story: "The Future" is actually a label in my Gmail inbox for emails about jobs and things), but that it isn't as close for us as it is for the many college seniors and graduates at FWT.

A lot of this career stuff focused on getting into feminist activism, which tends to be 1) based in New York City and 2) not very well paid. I feel that after this week I definitely have a leg up going after internships at the organizations we visited, but I need to spend my summer earning a bucketload of money so I can go abroad (to a country whose currency is, of course, stronger than the dollar, waaah), and interning at an activist organization while living in New York is GENERALLY not the most advisable way to find yourself rolling in cash.

One thing I wish we had covered: How do you apply your feminist values in field that isn't explicitly feminist? Many of the women and men we met didn't have much of an interest in working outside of a feminist organization, but some of us do! Fellow FWTer Tiffany is currently studying Art Education, and we had some good chats about being teachers, especially in public schools, and working feminism into education while addressing a fixed and possibly not-progressive curriculum.

I've never really considered majoring/minoring/concentrating in gender studies because I see feminism as something that informs what I do, but isn't necessarily...all I want to do. I think Molly and I certainly shared this feeling, as you can probably see from our post on literature and media. I am a feminist, yes. But mostly I am a feminist student. A feminist English major. A feminist reader and consumer. A feminist hopeful teacher.

Do you apply "feminist" (or other political/social/economic/religious movement terminology) to something else that you do? How do you do it?

Feminist Winter Term: All good things must come to an end

Whew. Today was the first day I've spent sitting around my apartment instead of racing around the city at top speed, since Monday. It's nice to be able to relax and reflect a bit; I have so much to process and think about. So for the next few days, Colleen and I will be working on short summaries of the week's events and the Feminist Winter Term moments that stuck out the most. Hopefully we'll do the week some justice and get to fill in the gaps for whoever will read this and for each other - it was really hard to blog when we were both so busy during the week. Colleen and I also had very different weeks ourselves, so we'll be blogging for each other as much as we'll be blogging for everyone else.

Feminist Winter Term: Reproductive Justice

I knew I had to blog about this, but it's hard starting out. This is going to include some depressing and upsetting stuff--just a warning.

This morning we split up into six small groups to visit different reproductive health organizations around New York. Some people went to abortion clinics and women's health centers, others to adoption agencies.

I went with Lela, Naomi, and Mackenzie to Choices Women's Medical Center in Queens. Choices, founded by activist Merle Hoffman (pictured above), provides gynecological and prenatal care to women, often with the help of Medicaid. Their services include care by a midwife, gynecological exams, birth control and emergency contraceptives, sterilization (Essure), pregnancy testing, Gardasil, and abortions up to 24 weeks. Their staff speak many languages, though the languages most in demand in the area are Spanish, Bengali, and Creole French.

I wasn't quite sure what to expect when I came to Choices. We first met one protester outside, an older woman who handed us some "pro-life" pamphlets. Earlier in the week we'd seen Jennifer's film "I Had An Abortion" which included footage of huge protests outside clinics, complete with protesters holding up pictures of babies and screaming at women entering Planned Parenthoods and other providers. I didn't expect to see a crowd of people, but I wasn't exactly surprised when the single protester (who Merle later identified as Dorothy) handed me the pamphlet. She wasn't shouting or holding up signs, just wordlessly handing these out.

Most of the people inside Choices were minorities, and most of them looked sad. Which isn't a surprise...yet it is very stunning to look at the people in the waiting room and realize that many of them were about to have an abortion. You can usually walk into any other medical waiting room and not know what people are there for--it could be a checkup or a big procedure. Choices does offer a lot of other services, but they also perform 40-60 abortions each day...you know that's what some of the women in the waiting room are waiting for. It feels incredibly intrusive and humbling to be there not as a fellow patient, but as an observer.

We've discussed abortion a lot this week, and one point that keeps coming up is that an aborted fetus is not really just a bunch of cells. It's easy for pro-choice activists to make this argument to counter the anti-choice argument that a fetus is a life or a human being. But our discussions this week have illuminated, at least for me, that it's not so easy to distinguish. When we met with Merle, she emphasized that if a pregnant individual chooses not to terminate a pregnancy...it does become a life. A baby. "This is the only area where women make the decision of life and death," she told us, "And that's why it's so opposed." She was not afraid to say that abortion is killing.

At first, that seems like a harsh way to think about it. No one wants to kill. As a feminist who supports abortion because I believe that a woman should have autonomy over her own body, it's hard (but not impossible) to reconcile that with the reality of taking a life, even if it exists within that body. But, as Merle said, "You can't put a diaphragm on your brain or your heart." You have to consider all this, thoughtfully and carefully and lovingly.

Abortion isn't supposed to be an easy choice. It is a maternal one, and it may be an obvious choice, or a necessary one, and for most women it is a choice without regret, but one thing we have learned is that it is difficult. Merle noted that a pregnancy is a possibility...terminating a pregnancy, even if it's the right thing to do, is the end of a possibility.

We spoke to a doctor who has worked at Choices for decades. The story he shared with us was, I think, the hardest for us to hear, and the hardest for me to share here. He told us that second-trimester pregnancies involve a fetus with recognizable body parts, though they are not yet fully formed or connected. Doctors have to extract all of these parts from the uterus, and ensure that they are all extracted. He told us that many women want to see what has been taken out of them. He told us that one patient, even though he told her that the body parts were disconnected, wanted some piece of her aborted fetus to hold. He--a doctor who has done thousands of abortions--began to cry (and so did we) as he told us that he placed a hand in hers.

That's an image you don't soon forget.

Feminist Winter Term: Literature, Inclusion, and Privilege

Sorry, readers! Blogger's been acting up, but we can post now!

In which Molly and Colleen blog via Gchat a la Sexist Beatdown...even though they are sitting next to each other. (And listening to Destiny's Child.)

Colleen: So yesterday at Feminist Winter Term, we headed to the Feminist Press, where we heard from the publishers and interns who work there. They publish obscure or out-of-print works and current work relating to women's issues. One question they asked us was, "What do you read?" I think we were both feeling like we had to respond with a bunch of feminist titles, and a lot of Winter Termers did.

Molly: Talking about the literature I love with other feminists is always scary for me. I'm painfully aware of the fact that I enjoy and value a lot of literature that does not necessarily enjoy or value female characters. When one of the Feminist Press staff members asked what we were currently reading, I stopped myself before I told the group my current "affair" (one of the staffers made the brilliant observation that beginning a new book is like starting a new love affair). Bright Lights, Big City is an exceptionally written book featuring dynamic, complex male characters and exceptionally flat, one-dimensional women. Not too many feminist nutrients in this one.

Colleen: I do recall you saying that you were into the Beats and that you could be frustrated with their misogyny but still really like them. And yeah, I totally wrote a similar blog a few posts ago, but we had a really fabulous conversation following this discussion at Feminist Press.

Also I'm so glad we're listening to Destiny's Child right now.

Molly: The clothes I'm wearing? I bought 'em. No really, I did. But seriously, the intersection of the WGS department and the English department this past semester forced me to acknowledge the fact that I read a lot of literature written by the very dead white guys I get angry at in the political part of my brain. Yes, I have relegated politics and fiction (including poetry) to separate areas of my brain. An act of force and desperation. Not to be dramatic.

Colleen: No, it makes sense. And it's entirely possible, as I said before, to critically engage with something that is politically troubling and still find it very wonderful literature. And all of that is in more detail in the older post, and in even better detail on Tiger Beatdown. But I think what we were talking about before, and what we oughta be talking about now, is what we're expected, if that's the right word, to be reading.

Molly: all my independent women throw your hands up at me

Colleen: Hands up. And anyway, like when they asked us what we were reading, everyone was like, "THIS SUPER RADICAL FEMINIST BOOK BY A SUPER RADICAL QUEER THEORIST" which is totally fine, but I was like, um, well, right now I'm reading Pride and Prejudice, but after that I'm going to read The Corrections. And probably some more books by men. OOPS.

Molly: I've read a lot of feminist literature as of late, including both the pop-feminism type books that Jessica Valenti and Courtney Martin write, and some more heady, academic stuff. And I think what I struggle most with is reconciling what I believe I "should" be reading with what I really crave. Sometimes it's just not as fun for me to read books that upset me or make me think long and hard about things that need to be change; I'd rather get wrapped up in a great story, and carried away from everything for a while. Which is not to say that literature doesn't have political and social implications - it totally does! Everyone knows it does! But sometimes it's really hard for me to balance reading books that I know are IMPORTANT to read with books that I think are delicious.

I also read a lot of feminist blogs every day, and I often feel like that's my "medicine" or my "required" feminist reading.

Even though I love reading them.

Colleen: SO true. And that is particularly relevant after our visit to Bust Magazine. I know some Winter Termers found that visit frustrating because, yeah, Bust doesn't exactly cover all issues, it can be heteronormative and doesn't really consider class and race all that much. For the most part, it seems like a magazine for young straight ladies. And sure, I can say, "That's not fully feminist, there are so many things they're not covering," and I do say that, I recognize it, but at the same time...I'm a young feminist lady who likes pop culture and crafts, and liking those things (and also boys) and reading a magazine that caters to those interests doesn't disqualify me from Feminism(s) at Large. And Bust has never claimed to be a magazine for Feminism(s) at Large...they simply saw a gap in the media and decided to fill it with things they thought were awesome. They started out by making things that they and their friends enjoyed. And they can still have an impact on media and how readers and advertisers think about the ladies without necessarily approaching it on a really broad, completely inclusive scale.

And there were Winter Termers who were like, "That was so weird when they were like, 'Ooh, yeah, there's more flirting when there are men in the office,'" and I can see why they felt iffy about that, but also maybe that is true and that is how they talk and I think there is a balance one may find between running around going FUCK THE KYRIARCHY and also going LET'S BE LIGHTHEARTED. 

And I do feel awkward saying that because I know so many people who go, "You have no sense of humor/fun" when I get mad at them for making jokes, so I feel like I'm doing the same thing when I defend Bust, but...yes.

Molly: I read Bust and love it and know exactly what you're talking about. But I still struggle with the fact that the magazine seems to appeal to a very very particular kind of feminist. Although, Amy said some really interesting things after our visit about how Bust was always this way and has never tried to be anything else. Which can be okay.

Colleen: Yeah! Like no one ever said fishing magazines really oughta be covering trapping and bow hunting too.

 Actually, I have no facts to support that...nor do I think that fishing holds some kind of privilege over trapping and bow hunting OH COLLEEN THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A SIMPLE ANALOGY, SHUT UP

Molly: I think the theme here is that it's really easy to feel inadequate. Which sounds really whiney and privileged. Which makes me feel further inadequate. But I think that can be a reality in any sort of activist community - you're never critical enough of the culture, and you're always leaving someone out. Which is why I loved what Latoya Peterson said about how dangerous it is to think like or act like your feminism is the only feminism.

Or as Beyonce eloquently says, "I'm a survivor, keep on survivin"

"out of all the darkness and sadness, still comes happiness"

Colleen: Exactly! Like, engage in feminism, often in ways that are good for you, but constantly remind yourself that there is so much more to be done, and that people like us, who are privileged in every way except in our ladyness (i.e. we are white, hetero, cis, college-educated, etc, and yes, this is very much inspired by the Tiger Beatdown post "13 Ways of Looking at Liz Lemon" which remains one of my elementary feminist texts), are obligated to use our privilege to influence things beyond our white/hetero/etc sphere.

Molly: wow you are sure typing a lot

Colleen: But also, to get back to a point about literature that we started out on...whoa tangent whole blog post whoa...I don't think that being a feminist means that you must read explicitly feminist books all the damn time, which I think was the vibe we were getting sometimes. I was afraid that if I said to some of these folks that I read Philip Roth and John Updike and sometimes--gasp--I like their stuff, they'd be like "SHUN THE BAD FEMINIST." Of course I do not think this would actually have happened, like I'm sure all of these fine ladies and gentlemen read a variety of books, and the work done at Feminist Press to publish things that aren't by misogynist old white dudes (Great American Novelists to everyone else) is really important because it brings variety to the literary table. 

And today at Bluestockings, the radical bookstore where I did my internship, I thought about that a lot. Like, it's great that Bluestockings shelves really great books by ladies and about ladies and about queer theory and sex and social movements that wouldn't be so highlighted elsewhere, and also that Bluestockings provides a space for feminist people to come in and talk about feminist issues and anarchy and menstruation. But if I only read the books at Bluestockings I'd feel like my reading was one-sided. So what I'm trying to say is, it's a great place, but it shouldn't be your only source--and to expand that, feminism is awesome, and it should color everything that you do, but it shouldn't take over everything that you do, if that makes sense. Unless you want it to, in which case that's great. But for now I'll keep bell hooks next to John Updike if I want to.

BUT THERE'S MORE:

Email: Colleen to Molly, 12:58 am:

Also a lot of things I thought about in the shower that I want to add in:

I don't think I can confidently say that I know a lot of things about literature, but if there is one thing I know for sure it is that we all have something to learn from each other. And I think that is probably also true of humanity. This made me think especially about debates in educational circles about what to teach the kiddies.

There are a lot of people saying that canonical works aren't exactly relevant to, say, black students at impoverished schools. And there are the people who say that many canonical works, even if they're by dead white men, are still about the human condition and can be quite universal--they say this especially about Shakespeare, and I agree. But basically this argument comes down to, "The dead white men, well, they're fine for those kids in the suburbs, but what do we teach poor kids in urban schools?" And I'm like...who says dead white men are fine for the kids in the suburbs? We should ALL be reading works by a variety of authors.

If we're going to put every writer into categories of race/sex/gender/class/sexual orientation, let's face it, every writer is going to be in a particular subset. Obviously no one is going to transcend them, everyone's going to be in some kind of permutation of categories. And to suggest that a person in one permutation can't be relevant to a reader who fits into another permutation is rather absurd. To suggest that Shakespeare and Twain can't be relevant to someone who is, unlike them, nonwhite or queer is ridiculous, and to suggest that, say, Toni Morrison isn't relevant to me just because I'm white is also ridiculous.

I know that there's a different dynamic of privilege there, but my point is that writers are generally trying to talk to everybody. I think we all recognize that despite differences in circumstance, people DO share some universal emotions and experiences, and that means that writers of all circumstances have universal experiences, stemming out of particular circumstances, to talk about with everybody else.

SLEEP

More Feminist Winter Term: The Education of Feminist Winter Termers

As a young, excited, and (probably ignorantly) idealistic feminist, being able to sit down with Shelby Knox and chat informally about comprehensive sex education, reproductive justice, Christianity, and making change as a fourth wave (!) activist was nothing short of heavenly. Shelby Knox is a young, idealistic activist herself, who is most well known for her campaign to procure actual sex education (with real pictures of anatomy and everything!), as opposed to the abstinence-only, dirty-toothbrush-vs.-clean-toothbrush-as-an-acceptable-analogy-to-a-woman-pre-and-post-coitus-out-of-wedlock bullshit that she and her peers received in her hometown of Lubbock, Texas. You can watch a preview of the 2005 documentary that tells her story here. Shelby is so young, dynamic, and passionate; she has already taken so much incredible action, and made so much incredible change. And she is only 24.

It wasn't just that Shelby has a remarkable success story to tell. It is that she's exactly the kind of young person I want to be. She leveled herself with the group immediately by sitting with us at the big table at the Ms. Foundation instead of standing in the front of the room and lecturing. She was so warm and engaging that I almost felt like I was talking to an old friend. And she said some really amazing things about the importance of the movement and the direction in which she sees the movement heading. I hope I'm not making any giant assumptions here, but I think that her words can resonate with many many women with different experiences, different feminisms, different oppressors, and different experiences with oppresssion.

Something Shelby said that really struck me was that the moment she realized she was a feminist was the moment she realized that feminism is hearing your pain or experience in another woman's voice and realizing that: there's nothing wrong with you. There's nothing wrong with her. But there's something wrong with the world that makes us think there is. This seemed like such a perfect way to articulate the moment that many of us (myself included) came to feminism, but have been unable to put into words, or perhaps to fully comprehend so far. Many winter-termers described taking a gender studies class and feeling like everything "just made sense," or of having what one participant described as "latent feminism" throughout life, only brought to the forefront at a pivotal moment of emotional connection of the sort that Shelby referred to. I've recognized my own experience in the stories of so many people (not just the voices of straight cis women, but those of trans women, trans men, queer women, queer men, etc., all struggling with constraining gender constructs and our society's limited binaries, dichotomies, and stereotypes), and I owe these connections to feminism.

Although I think that any social justice movement can bring people together in an exceptionally beautiful way, I love that our generation of feminists is so inclusive and so wide-reaching. Shelby referred to us as the "fourth wave" of feminism, which terrifies and thrills me at the same time; it also confirms a lot of my thoughts about the way in which my peers and I differ from feminists just a bit older than us. I think that the proliferation of media and technology is changing feminism more rapidly than our feminist mothers ever thought possible - it's becoming more intersectional and more wide-reaching with every single tweet and every blog post. As Shelby said, you no longer have to be able to afford college to take a gender studies course, because it's all on the interwebs. I'm still pretty confused (and I think I'll continue to be confused) about where to draw a distinction between the third wave and the fourth wave, or if there is even a real distinction to be made. But it was cool to hear someone I really look up to make the distinction so eloquently and fearlessly. Aaaanyway.

Back to Shelby's lovely words about seeing your pain in another person. I spend so much time examining flaws and disconnects within the movement; the more I think about it, much of my time spent being a feminist is time spent criticizing feminism. But Shelby's seemingly boundless excitement and tangible awe at the simple fact that feminism connects people and legitimizes their experiences made me remember what's undeniably amazing about being a feminist. Which is not to say that there aren't huge flaws to address, within both feminist spaces and the broader cultural context. If there weren't, we wouldn't have anything to fight for. And really, where's the fun in that?

Feminist Winter Term: Sex & Sex Work

Molly, Alicia, and I are currently in New York City at Feminist Winter Term, a program for college-age feminists run by Soapbox Inc. (Click the link for more info.) Today was our first day!

We're super-tired right now--it's been a long day running around New York. But here's a quick summary of what we did today! Molly will write in tomorrow about her afternoon; she was in a different group today.

First we all met with Jennifer and Amy, the founders of Soapbox, at Amy's apartment. We had delicious food (I didn't know orange juice could taste that good) and met all of the participants. There are young women (and one man) from around the United States and Canada. We all feel that it's wonderfully refreshing and fun to be around people with whom you instantly share the basic tenets of a political/social philosophy...though we may be different people, from different schools and different parts of the continent, we're all on the same feminist page. It's easy to get into discussions with people when you know you already have similar ideas about discrimination, abortion rights, sexuality, etc. I talked to a bunch of people on our many walks and subway rides, and I'm excited to get to know them all better!

After the meeting at the apartment, we headed to Babeland, a sex toy shop celebrating women's sexuality. The atmosphere is Bath-and-Body-Works-ish--warm, inviting, and clean (appearance- and hygiene-wise)--but instead of scented soaps, it's vibrators, dildos, and condoms. Do check out their website, it's awesome!

In the afternoon, we were split into two groups. Alicia and I were in group 1, which went first to the Sex Workers Project. We learned that the SWP approaches sex work as an occupation that individuals come to through choice, circumstance (financial hardship and no other options), or coercion. They believe that sex work should be de-criminalized, which, they said, would not lead to an increase in human trafficking. Using harm reduction strategies, they use therapy and legal action to support people who are or have been, legally or illegally, involved in sex work.

There was a lot of frustration at SWP, but also a lot of hope. It's scary yet awe-inspiring to see this kind of intense, feminist, hands-on approach to a problem. After this one meeting, I was reeling with ideas.

We then headed to the NoVo Foundation, which is dedicated to empowering women and girls worldwide. Where the Sex Workers Project was an organization working directly with individuals, NoVo is a foundation, funded by a single donation, which gives money to organizations working to further the goals of 1) social and emotional education, 2) empowerment of adolescent girls, and 3) ending violence against women and girls.

Unlike SWP, NoVo believes that legalizing prostitution (a term they used instead of "sex work"--more on this in a bit) will lead to an increase in human trafficking, and they support the "Swedish model" in which pimps and johns are prosecuted for buying sex, rather than a system in which women are prosecuted for selling it.

Of course, to say that SWP and NoVo are complete opposites is a misunderstanding; NoVo may acknowledge sex work/prostitution, but they also point out that the majority of people in the sex industry are not there by choice; they are forced by other people or by financial hardship to sell their bodies. SWP would, I think, agree with that, but their strategy is simply much more support-based; they are there to help people after trafficking has happened. NoVo is broader and more idealistic...they're working to attack trafficking at its roots, hoping to eventually stop it.

It was interesting to hear the differences in language between the two. Maybe as an English major, I'm particularly attuned to shifts in language, but the sudden substitution of "prostitution" for "sex work" was startling. "Sex work" certainly reflects SWP's belief that it can be a valid, legal field for a woman to enter if she truly chooses to enter it, whereas "prostitution" is an older, more traditional way to describe it, and makes selling sex a much more passive act.

Well, for now it's time to go to bed. My shoulders are aching (from carrying bags...and from looking up all the time at really tall buildings) and my brain hurts even more. Look forward to more posts as the week goes on!

Hating sexism, loving English literature

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Why I Vote

Jon Stewart's Rally to Restore Sanity

I love that Jon Stewart is parlaying his celebrity into political action. I think a rally to counter Beck's and Palin's is long overdue and I think Stewart, from what I know, is as good of a leader as any.

I'm less thrilled about the name.

You could even say I'm angry.

The implicit message behind the "Rally to Restore Sanity" is that individuals influencing America's current political climate are "insane." Crazy. Wacko. It's Stewart pointing at a picture of Beck and circling an index finger around his ear. And it pisses me off.

No one in Stewart's entire machine thought twice about invoking the experiences of an entire group of people who are already oppressed and using them for their own purposes. This kind of language only serves to reinforce the existing and damaging stigma against mental illness. It both pathologizes the lack of critical thought characteristic of Glenn Beck's particular brand of bigoted conservatism, in some ways removing personal responsibility from individuals who choose to adhere to that political ideology, and fails to actually address the flaws behind it. At the same time, it reinforces that crazy is universally a bad thing. Crazy needs to be eliminated to fix America.

And what about the 26.2% of Americans who experience a diagnosable mental illness in a given year, Mr. Stewart? You're telling one out of every four people: your experiences and opinions are not valuable. Your experiences are worth less than mine. That's a terribly progressive message to be sending.

How difficult would it have been to title the event differently? "Rally to Restore Reason"? "Rally to Restore Common Sense"? Probably not terribly taxing.

(Why am I posting about this here? Because if 26.2% of Americans experience mental illness in a given year, probably half or so of those are women. I can't fight for women's rights unless I fight for all women's rights. For more on how mental illness and disability in general are a feminist issue, I recommend this post at The Curvature, this post at The Gimp Parade, and the archives at FWD/Forward.)

feminism, beauty standards, and compromise

Hey, people. I originally posted this to my tumblr (where I often blog or reblog about issues related to feminism--it's great for collecting links or relevant posts) but felt it was relevant to repost here, especially given Kenyon's particular fashion scene and the effort that often goes into even getting ready for class.

--

Today in my Intro to Women’s and Gender Studies class we had the beginnings of a really interesting conversation about the performance of femininity and cultural beauty standards and rituals (before we were cut short by time constraints). It’s something that I’ve been thinking about a lot lately as I’ve become more involved with both feminism and fatshion online.

I tend to justify the amount of energy I put into beauty/fashion by arguing that as a fat woman, it’s subversive of me to do so. It’s transgressive for me to be well-dressed and happy in public, because the vast majority of society believes that fat women don’t deserve to dress well or aren’t worthy of being held to the same beauty standards as other women.

But I’m well aware that it would be equally or more transgressive to stop performing femininity and continue to be happy. I continue to perform femininity in large part because it is the easier choice for me. It is easier for me to be considered conventionally attractive and conventionally well-dressed than to wear whatever I feel like wearing regardless of the consequences.

I can push the envelope in small ways: I can wear leggings with tunics, and clothing that is similarly both trendy and revealing of my fat body; I can stop shaving my legs, and go bare-legged in short skirts with my legs all hairy; I can wear my curly hair down around my shoulders even though it takes up a lot more space than advertising and current fashion suggests it should.

But I’m not going to shave my head or get a buzz-cut, even though I want to, because in six or so months I’ll be interviewing for my first real, grown-up jobs, and I need to look like society’s image of someone mature, and responsible, and conventional, and that means having an actual hairstyle, not just a few months of stubble. And when I go to those interviews, I’m going to put on tinted moisturizer and pressed powder and blush and eyeshadow and mascara and eyeliner.

Hell, tomorrow, I will put on mascara and eyeliner, and put goop in my frizzy, thick, curly hair to “tame” it and feel like a horrible feminist while simultaneously feeling horribly self-conscious of my hairy legs. As women, as feminists, we are constantly presented with impossible choices. I don’t think there are any right answers here.

Favorite Blogs

Hey everyone!

A few people at the meeting on Sunday asked for blog recommendations. I have a few that I read regularly and will list here, but if you have favorites, please post them in the comments!

Feministing: Young Feminists Blogging, Organizing, Kicking Ass
http://www.feministing.com
Oh, Feministing! Feministing is a great blog to start reading when you're interested in activism and want a broad variety of news from a feminist perspective. Jessica Valenti and Courtney Martin (speakers at Kenyon last year) are both editors, as is Jaclyn Friedman (coming September 24th).

Jezebel: Celebrity, Sex, Fashion for Women. Without Airbrushing.
http://www.jezebel.com
Jezebel is my "I should be doing reading for class but I'd rather look at pictures of puppies and read feminist critique of popular culture" fix.

Yes Means YES!: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape
http://yesmeansyesblog.wordpress.com/
This blog lists many contributors but the most frequent is Thomas Macaulay Millar, a pseudonymous writer who tackles the same issues as the book Yes Means YES! with an awesome feminist perspective.

Racialicious
http://www.racialicious.com/
Racialicious focuses on the intersection of popular culture and race.

Emily Nagoski, Sex Nerd
http://enagoski.wordpress.com/
Emily's blog is particularly interesting because she is a health and sexuality educator and comes from a scientific perspective on many sexual issues.

Vagina Pagina: Vulva la revolucion!
http://www.vaginapagina.com/
Vagina Pagina is not a blog but rather an online community (started on Livejournal) "that offers a supportive, progressive, body- and sex-positive environment in which to discuss issues related to female sexual and reproductive health and wellness." Vagina Pagina has innumerable informative resources on these topics and is an awesome place to go for questions about health and sexual wellbeing.

My current favorite blog is not explicitly feminist or gender-focused at all but just for fun: The Non-Consumer Advocate (http://www.thenonconsumeradvocate.com) is a fantastic blog about one woman's experiences with consumption and her attempts to consume less and more consciously.

I'm interested in seeing what blogs you all read and what you think of the ones I listed here, so let me know in the comments!

Dispatch from the Front

Just moved in to home sweet Crozier. Unfortunately it smells musty, kind of like dead cat lady. Hopefully we will be able to remedy that before everyone joins us!

I'm excited to see you all in the 'bier. Have a wonderful rest of the summer.

Alicia

Girls Will Be Boys: Projecting Societal Conceptions of Gender onto Children

On my way to work the other morning, I overheard a really unsettling conversation on a radio talk show. The hosts were in the midst of a discussion about Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt's 4-year-old daughter, Shiloh. Normally, I don't get involved in celebrity gossip, but this caught my attention for several reasons. First, who the heck talks about a 4-year-old on national, local, or any kind of radio? Secondly, don't we all have better things to do and bigger problems to worry about? Above all, though, I was particularly intrigued and disturbed by their discussion of Shiloh's gender presentation.Apparently, it is a huge-freaking-deal that Shiloh Jolie-Pitt dresses in tracksuits and wants her hair cut short. The radio commentators suggested that Shiloh, who was recently spotted in a pair of boy's swimming trunks, is becoming "a little dyke." This issue is, in fact, so pressing that not only have DJs devoted minutes of their shows to the Shiloh J.P. lesbian conspiracy, but trusted news sources (Life & Style, US Weekly, People) have followed suit. Life & Style brought to the forefront the question that has clearly been on all of our minds: through allowing Shiloh to wear clothes marketed for boys and not exposing her to enough "girlie things," are Brad and Angelina ruining their child's life? Why would they do this to her? Stop being totally unfit parents and put the girl in a dress already!

My limited knowledge of and level of concern for the Pitt-Jolie family not withstanding, let me tell you that I absolutely do not care what Shiloh chooses to wear, say, or do. As a matter of fact, I have very few limitations to what I find acceptable in the realm of childhood self-expression. I was a wild woman, as my parents allowed me to dress myself, and I came up with all sorts of ensembles featuring wacky hats, mixed patterns, and gratuitous accessories. But through this experimentation, especially at an age when I was still mostly unaware of all that is trendy or socially acceptable, I became completely confident in any way I chose to present myself to the world. Therefore, it blows my mind that full-grown adults utilize the choices of one little girl, who is unknowingly and unintentionally in the public eye, to launch discussions of what is and isn't acceptable for girls and boys.

This whole "is she or isn't she a girl?" controversy makes it remarkably evident that gender policing begins at an incredibly young age. From the moment we are wrapped in a pink or blue blanket and welcomed into the world to the time when we are able to make our own informed decisions and analyses, we are under the careful guidance of the adults in our lives. They are the ones who will teach us how we should and shouldn't interact with the rest of the world, and will help us shape our future beliefs and senses. And to make this impact, we can't just worry about what our kids are wearing. We have to worry about what they're playing with:


















(Above: one of the bestselling boy's toys and of the bestselling girl's toys on target.com)

We have to worry about what they're reading:



















We even have to worry about what they're watching, thinking, eating... we have to worry a lot. If we are not extra vigilant, our children will become the next feature on the KISS FM morning show.

We give little girls purses and credit cards so they can practice going into debt after one too many shopping sprees & applying their lipstick while weaving through morning traffic. We give little boys miniature axes and tools to they can practice putting their lives in danger while pursuing heroic professions. We give little girls books such as the Twilight series so they can daydream about becoming a two-dimensional character who waits for a mysterious man to sweep her off of her feet, teaching them lessons that will no doubt trickle into their day to day lives. We give little boys books such as The Day My Butt Went Psycho (which is, mind you, based on a true story) so that they can not only laugh about the unsurpassed humor which is the runaway buttocks, but so that they can find pleasure in reading as an escape from what is real. Granted, these are all exaggerations and generalizations, but what we can draw from them is that we treat girls and boys much differently (duh...), and therefore, expect different things from them.

By putting these examples in place, we are telling children that girls and boys will want to do, say, wear, and be different things. By not having prevalent examples of possible transgressions for these norms, we are saying to kids that some things are just for boys and some are just for girls. And this is how children learn to police gender. If a girl, like Shiloh, wants to wear pants, it is apparently okay to call her out for being out of the ordinary. If a boy wanted to read Twilight, he might be singled out as odd or even queer. It makes me sad that children learn these labels from adults, and that they become experts at identifying gender at a very young age.

We project our notions of what is right and wrong for different genders onto our children because we don't want them to stand out for not cooperating with these unwritten rules. But through doing this, aren't we just limiting the creativity and expressive ability of future generations? Is there a way we can avoid this, or are gender norms such a built-in component in society that it is impossible not to acknowledge it? Do you think it's possible to raise gender-neutral children? Even though I am less than optimistic after hearing the offensive commentary on the radio the other day, I would like to hear your thoughts. How can we make a move toward gender acceptance or neutrality, especially in terms of children?

Defending Photoshop

Observe Lindsay's magical moving bellybutton!

Yesterday I read this article on Gizmodo: UK's Girl Scouts Cry for New Photoshopped-Images Law for Airbrushed Celebrities. We've heard it before--not only do skinny models perpetuate unrealistic expectations for media-vulnerable girls (and boys), but Photoshop helps make them even skinnier and more flawless.

I'm not a huge fan of these arguments to begin with because blaming thin models for a world of self-image and body issues seems rather narrow-minded. Saying that Barbies and Kate Moss are the sole causes of things like eating disorders overlooks the complexities of body issues, ignores the fact that society perpetuates ideas about desirable physical characteristics in other ways, and doesn't give girls enough credit (are all of us really so easily brainwashed?). I also dislike the way that some advertisements have now begun using the term "real women" when portraying models and actresses who are "curvy." First of all because they still only use women who fit a specific beauty standard, and second because...GUYS, ALL WOMEN ARE REAL. Are we supposed to believe that the thin ones are just holograms?

But back to the point, which is that "Photoshop" has become synonymous with all-out photo manipulation--it's a magic genie that puts embarrassing things in your friends' hands, pops absent family members into group pictures, and, of course, tucks in that model's tummy and erases wrinkles.

I'm not denying that Photoshop is used to make a lot of things totally unrealistic, but I think that some vehement, anti-Photoshop consumers forget that Photoshop, like any superpower, can be used for good or for evil. Let's talk 'shop:

Photographs are not perfect representations of the world as it is. Yes, they can be very accurate, and they can help us understand things that were very difficult or impossible to see pre-photography. But there will always be something that changes when you compress a three-dimensional object into a two-dimensional one. The human eye is incredibly sophisticated, and while cameras can do a lot of things that eyes can't, a camera will never perfectly mimic the way the eye and brain perceive the world.

We all know that a photograph of a beautiful landscape, however lovely the photograph may be, is never quite as good as observing the landscape for yourself. Yes, part of that is the experience of being there--the smells, the sounds, all interacting with and enhancing your sight--but part of that is the simple fact that your eye notices far different things about the landscape and edits it for your brain in different ways than the photograph will. Same with people--when you're interacting with or even merely observing a person, you see that person as a three-dimensional object, and your eye often glosses over certain things without your notice.

During the summer, I work as a self-employed photographer. Most of the pictures I take are senior portraits for kids I know from high school. Recently I shot with a friend-of-a-friend, a girl I met the day of the shoot. Most clients do expect that I'll edit their pictures, because studios do airbrush the hell out of seniors, and I have to compete. And hey, it's your senior portrait, the one that'll be printed in the yearbook, the one people will remember you by. You want to look good.

But I also edit in Photoshop because there are things that show up in photographs that simply aren't noticeable in real life. When I started to flip through the pictures of my new client, I noticed some pimples on her forehead and some tiny hairs below her lip. I wasn't even zoomed in--it's just the way the light highlighted those features. I'd shot with this girl and talked to her for hours. Not once did I observe any of the flaws now glaring at me from the images. In real life, she had great skin and glossy black hair. In many of the photos, her pimples stood out, flyaway hairs (basically invisible to the eye in real life) distracted immensely, and the evening light gave her shiny hair a blue tint.

So yeah, I Photoshopped her pictures. I lightened shadows that fell across her face, I smoothed over the pimples and the facial hair, and took the blue out of her hair. I didn't do it to make her look unlike herself, I did it to make her look more like herself.

(People also ignore the fact that photographers manipulated photographs long before Photoshop. Heck, tools like Dodge and Burn are named for the darkroom processes that preceded them.)

There is, of course, a slippery slope. How do you even look at an image and decide if the camera has put too much or too little emphasis on a feature? If you can airbrush a distracting zit, is it okay to airbrush cellulite or wrinkles because they also wouldn't be as noticeable in person?

I maintain, though, that you can't give Photoshop itself a bad name. A "Photoshopped photo" isn't necessarily one that's been given excessive treatment with the liquify tool. Instead of banning photo manipulation or requiring a disclaimer, can't we educate people, especially children, about the ways that advertisers can change the appearance of an image--and why they do it?

Changing the Face of Feminism

I have spent the majority of my college years in fairly feminist-friendly environments. I've surrounded myself with optimistic, activist-oriented, awesome friends, and I've had pretty open-minded and liberal coworkers/bosses. Words like "slut" and expressions like "that's so gay" hardly ever enter the vernacular, and no one blinks an eye if I don't shave my legs for days, weeks, months on end (though, I should add, showering is a different story.) While at Kenyon we may complain about the attitude of the student body toward feminism, I've gotta say that all in all, things have only improved since my first year. I'd even go so far as to say (dare I?) that Kenyon is becoming an increasingly feminist campus in a lot of ways, mostly because of the perseverance and dedication of the student body to change the way things work in the 'Bier.

So imagine my surprise (saturated with sarcasm) when I attempt to re-enter the "real world" and am bombarded with the consumer-ready image of the angry feminist. Let's take a look at some of the gems I've been privy to during this summer break:

1) Women's Studies: The Horrors of Feminism Exposed
For those of you who haven't seen this preview until now, I am sorry. I just had to share this because it has it all: lesbianism, man-hating, yoga poses in the forest, faux-philosophical conversation about the sexes, and axe murder. If there is a cliché I left out, it is probably because I couldn't keep track of them all past the first 20 seconds of the trailer. To be honest, I cannot remember a time in which I sat in Crozier in a position other than the lotus pose, and I must not like anyone other than women if I spend that much time in the Women's Center. Go figure.

2) MTV's Disaster Date: Pop Culture Portrays the Feminist

For starters, let's not talk about the fact that I actually suffered through an episode of Disaster Date. To my credit, I was home sick and craving mindless television, but nonetheless I must admit that I was intrigued. The premise of Disaster Date, and pretty much any other hidden-camera reality show, is that someone has secretly put their friend in a potentially humiliating and uncomfortable situation. Contestants are set up on blind dates with actors who exhibit every characteristic and behavior that completely irks them. Take for example Antoine, the man who cannot stand "girls who don't shave their legs," "girls who boss him around," and, most of all, "feminists." That's my kind of man right there.

Long story short (you can check out the episode for yourself if you're so inclined: http://www.mtv.com/videos/disaster-date-seas-3-ep-9/1643951/playlist.jhtml), the actor goes to extremes to be exactly the type of "womyn" that Antoine cannot stand. She yells at a man who refers to the waitress by pet names, she displays her hairy legs during the meal thereby causing Antoine to gag, and she shows off her new ink: "WOMYN" in large block letters. Thank goodness this is only a prank, and Antoine walks away about $50 richer for suffering through his not-even-an-hour alone with the feminist wacko.

3) The Good Ol' General Public
While this is something I'd better get used to dealing with on a pretty regular basis, I still experience a lot of frustration in terms of my day to day dealings with people. Whether it's the oh-so-witty responses when I reveal that I am a Women's and Gender Studies Major (i.e.: "What are you gonna do with that? Be a lesbian?" Ha! What an EXCELLENT retort!) or the benevolent sexism of people asking me to take care of others or fetch them coffee because I am the only woman in the room, I have had to devote a great deal of effort to internalizing my feelings. Don't get me wrong, I speak up with I need to, but there are times when I have learned that things are best left unsaid.

The worst part of this, though, is that people make jokes about rape or domestic abuse or something else terrible, and they'll do it simply to get a rise out of me. The words "Don't mess with her, she's a feminist" get tossed around from time to time, and people make a big deal out of my beliefs even when I don't say anything about them. I feel like I'm on constant surveillance, that how I react and behave is continuously being monitored. If I slip up, it's a big deal, and if I don't react at all, it's an even bigger deal.


This is nothing earth-shattering or shocking in the least, but it's the sad truth that some people just expect feminists to adhere to the stereotype. It's sad to me that even in 2010, people think that simply the fact that they might "like cars and beer" (thank you, Lady Gaga quotation from long ago) or might shave their legs instantly means that they have been disqualified from participating in feminism. When will there be a day when feminism really is perceived as being for everybody? What will it take for society to depict feminists of all genders, ethnicites, sexes, socioeconomic backgrounds, sexual orientations, and ages? Why is our go-to image still a loud, angry college or middle-aged white woman with hairy legs?

We've tried the "This is What a Feminist Looks Like" campaign. We've been open about our views with people who know us for more than just our political agendas. We've hosted and planned events and programs targeted at wider populations with the hope that someday, we might capture the attention of someone who would have never attended something branded with the label of "feminism." But how can we start to change the image that has been ascribed to us? It's easy to cling to the label "feminist" because if offers a sense of solidarity and strength, but how can we step away from it for long enough to reclaim it and change its meaning? What is the most effective way to show people that we are more than what the word deems us to be?

The rest of the world is not necessarily like our cozy little haven of Crozier or Kenyon. While not always hostile or intentionally negative toward the cause, people beyond the movement do not necessarily want to hear what it's all about. Keeping that in mind, I think that the reclamation should begin in a place of comfort and solidarity, and that we should work together to create a new vision for today's modern feminist.

Today in What On Earth?: Jury Decides Consent is Not Required for Girls Gone Wild

Pretty much the only thing I can do in response to reading this is spew expletives.

They said she gave implicit consent by being at the bar, and by participating in the filming - though she never signed a consent form, and she can be heard on camera saying "no, no" when asked to show her breasts.

[cut]

So let this be a lesson to us all. "Consent" is a flexible thing - at least in the eyes of the St. Louis courts. No means yes, and assault means it's okay to roll the cameras. If there were ever a time to get righteously angry, it's now.

In what world does this make any sense? What can we do about this? We can have conversations about victim-blaming, and sexual assault, and what it means to give consent, and what it means to live in a rape culture. But that really doesn't seem like enough--not to me, not in this case. What do we do with our righteous anger?