Today, I am so grateful for having such great friends. I have old friends, book club friends, bellydancing friends, and motherhood related friends. There's overlap in all these groups, but they have their own history, their own dynamic and their own way in making feel useful and wanted in this world.
Their ability to help me synthesise my thoughts and create joy in my life is so important and needed.
I think having friends that are parents, and that are on the same vague parenting page as you, is almost essential to Motherhood. The way society is set up at the moment, stay-at-home mums tend to spend the majority of their time with their children as the only adult. Finding other Mothers who are on the same page makes connecting and hanging out that much easier, and the experience of Motherhood that little bit less lonely. So today I am grateful for those friends, and for finding friends, old and new.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
I think we need to stop using 'Stabby'
It's a great word, as it so accurately describes that feeling of rage that we got from douchecanoes, bad drivers and body police. It sounds kinda fun, lighthearted, with the -y ending.
But if we (progressives/feminists/equalists etc) are a community that is against violence, a community that is aware that violence and threats of violence are used against us, especially against women, I think it's a little lazy and crass for us to use such a violent term. Especially when usually we are just really fucking angry.
I know some of my very favourite bloggers use it, and those of you who do, I would love to hear from you. Am I completely off track? Is it something we should do, but meh, more important things?
Language, and the way we use it, is important. And something we should be aware of how we use.
Thoughts?
Discuss...
But if we (progressives/feminists/equalists etc) are a community that is against violence, a community that is aware that violence and threats of violence are used against us, especially against women, I think it's a little lazy and crass for us to use such a violent term. Especially when usually we are just really fucking angry.
I know some of my very favourite bloggers use it, and those of you who do, I would love to hear from you. Am I completely off track? Is it something we should do, but meh, more important things?
Language, and the way we use it, is important. And something we should be aware of how we use.
Thoughts?
Discuss...
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Men, I am not against you, I am for you.
Dear Men
I am a feminist. I do not hate you. I am not against you. I am for you!
I am for you being shown as stronger than your sexual urges; I know you can think beyond skin, short skirts, fuckability, your dick. I know you are able to think about whether your need for sex trumps other persons autonomy. I stand with you against that shit.
I am for you being smart and capable. Ads that show you as stupid, incapable of figuring out laundry are terrible. You are smart and intelligent and adult. I am for you being shown as capable in spheres outside your workplace, especially housework and parenting. If you can build a house, run a company, balance the books, you can figure out how to change a diaper or run a vacuum cleaner. I stand with you, sharing the load.
I am for you being encouraged to show your emotions. You are not less than because you cry, because you hug, because you kiss someone the same gender as you. I am for you showing your vulnerability, I stand with you against stoic stereotypes.
I am for you having equal parenting rights, especially when it comes to part time work and work culture. You should be able to have rights to part time/job-share work on par with your female counterparts who are parents. You should have equal leave rights when it comes to newborns. This should not only be enshrined in legislation but work culture as well. I stand with you against father equalling full time working missing out on your children absentee. Fuck that.
I am for you, I love you and the patriarchy fucks you over just as much as it does us. I stand with you, strong and staunch.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
32nd Down Under Feminists Carnival
Happy New Year Everybody.
I hope 2011 is full of awesome, stripey socks, kitty/puppy cuddles, yummy food and plenty of time for drinking/relaxing sleeping. Please replace any of the these with your desired relaxation/joy activities!
Welcome to the 32nd edition of the (dum, dum, de duuum)
Thanks to all those who have submitted, and a special thanks to the wonderful Chally for all her help and dealing with my last minute freak-outs!
Creativity/Geekery
The Hoydens share their love of the Sound of Music (Who woulda thunk Sound of Music was feminist!?) in BFTP Friday Hoyden: Top 10 reasons I love The Sound of Music
Disability
Over at Zero at the Bone, Chally talks about Constant Vigilance
Family/Women's Work
SAHM feminist gets on the soapbox.. breastfeeding in Public.
Spilt Milk talks on Maternity, from here
In a Strange Land, Deborah says Perhaps hitting children really is too horrible to contemplate
Blue Milk says - Quick, let's throw ourselves under a bus
Ariane shows how a woman's work is literally never done, especially at Christmas time: Christmas, brought to you by women
The Hoydens remind everyone that breastfeeding is not.about.you. BFTP: Parenting While Female: “It’s Not About You”
General Feminism/Social Justice
Jo talks about how Selley's have lost her business in I buy hardware supplies...
Over at The News with Nipples, Kim suggests that maybe feminists haven't yet achieved world domination - The F monster and world domination . It made me LOLSOB.
At The Fat Heffalump, we are reminded that It's OK to be 'Weird'? . And it really really is :).
The wonderful women over at at The Hand Mirror provide a list of Feminist blogging in Aotearoa New Zealand
Boganette on Why are you part of the women's liberation movement?
"Boganette resurrects a classic and the usual trolls show up to play!"
Mindy at The Hoydens is Bitter.
Language/Literature
Chally, clever thing that she is, has written a series of amazing posts on women and Iconography at Bitch Magazine. I suggest that you make yourself your favourite beverage of choice, put your feet up and read them.
Iconography: Octavia E. Butler and Rewriting the Other | books, authors, science fiction | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: Ursula K. Le Guin, the Model of a Modern Mythmaker | Science Fiction, women, literature | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: The Peony Pavilion | books, literature, feminism, theater | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: The Woman No One Saw | James Tiptree Jr., Alice B. Sheldon, books | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: The Rather Extraordinary Astrid Lindgren and Pippi Longstocking | books, gender, children | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: Harry Potter and the Girls Who Weren’t Chosen Ones | Bitch Magazine
LGBTQIA
The Hoydens talk about Captain Bridget Clinch - In Support of Captain Bridget Clinch and Pharaoh Kat follows up with some awesome activism in Supporting Captain Clinch and Why Pronouns Matter
Rachel Hills talks about What gay marriage opponents have in common with gay French philosophers - more then you would think!
Life
The Hoydens talk about Ethics classes to be offered in SRE time in NSW Finally, it looks like this ridiculous double standard is going to end.
Chally shows off her drawing skills at Chally and the uterine fistfight. Uteri and their aggressive natures, tsk, tsk!
Deborah talks about The Treacle in Adelaide.
Media
The News with Nipples gets a surprise in - Diplomats have opinions? I'm shocked
and then discusses the tension between bloggers and journalists in Our own worst enemy
Today in Double Standards touches on the increasingly concerning story of the Melbourne teenager and those photos.
Politics
Blue Milk talks about costuming in Do Not Fuck with Masculinity. Coz being dressed as 'female' is totes the worst thing eva!
Race/Racism
A really thought provoking series by Chally - Cultural Constructions, Part 1 .
Cultural Constructions, Part 2
Cultural Constructions, Part 3
Cultural Constructions: An Interlude
Tiara the Merch girl writes about how people only see her Otherness, which erases her queerness in Exotic Taboo [Love, Anonymously] .
Chally talks on Colouring Perception and how colour is subjective and cultural.
Repro Justice
At A Touch of the Crazy, Stef has a rant on The abortion law in this country needs to change now
The wonderful Hoydens dispel some abortion myths in BFTP: We knew it was bad for you, see!?!
Reviews
The Hoydens strike again in Review: Radical Act
Sex/Relationships
Ally talks about something that is not gross in Some Grossly Indulgent Self Promotion, And A Story Called Gross .
Breast Cancer
NZGirl started a highly inappropriate breast cancer awareness campaign. And it pissed NZ feminist bloggers off - and rightly so. Rachel Hansen asked Should we be asking girls to "get your tits out for the girls"? , followed by Queen Of Thorns says there is only one reason to care about breast cancer, rails against being a "prude" and discussing how the response from NZGirl was, well, less then stellar. At Pickled Tink, Amanda sums up and provides some links, and Boganette points out that it goes on and on and on. Scuba Nurse provides some actual education. At A lump in the road, a breast cancer survivor talks on her reaction to the campaign in Insensitive.
New blogger Annanonymous follows up with some thoughts about the pinkification of breast cancer .
The Body
Definatalie is Thirty and angry and fabulous, darling.
The Fat Heffalump talks about food judgement cliches in Food Judgement or The Post in Which I Make too Many Bad Food Puns .
Queen of Thorns writes on progressive and fat hate in You are actually part of the problem
Shall We Dance? - The Fat Heffalump talks about dancing and being fat, and a beautiful paragraph on muscle memory.
Spilt Milk writes Thanks, Doctor and then, amazingly, wonderfully and so truthfully in All of us (thoughts on fat acceptance) . Just brilliant.
Violence
Over at Geek Feminism they talk about how violence is not the solution to harassment, in “Why don’t you just hit him?” and continue with Harassment and bullying
On rape and rape culture, Blue Milk talks about Why most preventative strategies are set up wrong , News with Nipples provides some scary info on Police and rape myths, Stef talks about rape blame and Queen of Thorns does some signal boosting.
And last but not least, "Harriet J's call out against Naomi Wolf's Assange fuckery" in Dear Second and Third Wave Feminists With Publicly Recognizable Names
Thanks for stopping by everyone!
This concludes this edition! Submit your blog article to the next edition of Down Under Feminists carnival using our carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.
I hope 2011 is full of awesome, stripey socks, kitty/puppy cuddles, yummy food and plenty of time for drinking/relaxing sleeping. Please replace any of the these with your desired relaxation/joy activities!
Welcome to the 32nd edition of the (dum, dum, de duuum)
I've tried to make it as user-friendly as possible - I hope you enjoy!
Thanks to all those who have submitted, and a special thanks to the wonderful Chally for all her help and dealing with my last minute freak-outs!
Creativity/Geekery
The Hoydens share their love of the Sound of Music (Who woulda thunk Sound of Music was feminist!?) in BFTP Friday Hoyden: Top 10 reasons I love The Sound of Music
Disability
Over at Zero at the Bone, Chally talks about Constant Vigilance
Family/Women's Work
SAHM feminist gets on the soapbox.. breastfeeding in Public.
Spilt Milk talks on Maternity, from here
In a Strange Land, Deborah says Perhaps hitting children really is too horrible to contemplate
Blue Milk says - Quick, let's throw ourselves under a bus
Ariane shows how a woman's work is literally never done, especially at Christmas time: Christmas, brought to you by women
The Hoydens remind everyone that breastfeeding is not.about.you. BFTP: Parenting While Female: “It’s Not About You”
General Feminism/Social Justice
Jo talks about how Selley's have lost her business in I buy hardware supplies...
Over at The News with Nipples, Kim suggests that maybe feminists haven't yet achieved world domination - The F monster and world domination . It made me LOLSOB.
At The Fat Heffalump, we are reminded that It's OK to be 'Weird'? . And it really really is :).
The wonderful women over at at The Hand Mirror provide a list of Feminist blogging in Aotearoa New Zealand
Boganette on Why are you part of the women's liberation movement?
"Boganette resurrects a classic and the usual trolls show up to play!"
Mindy at The Hoydens is Bitter.
Language/Literature
Chally, clever thing that she is, has written a series of amazing posts on women and Iconography at Bitch Magazine. I suggest that you make yourself your favourite beverage of choice, put your feet up and read them.
Iconography: Octavia E. Butler and Rewriting the Other | books, authors, science fiction | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: Ursula K. Le Guin, the Model of a Modern Mythmaker | Science Fiction, women, literature | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: The Peony Pavilion | books, literature, feminism, theater | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: The Woman No One Saw | James Tiptree Jr., Alice B. Sheldon, books | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: The Rather Extraordinary Astrid Lindgren and Pippi Longstocking | books, gender, children | Bitch Magazine
Iconography: Harry Potter and the Girls Who Weren’t Chosen Ones | Bitch Magazine
LGBTQIA
The Hoydens talk about Captain Bridget Clinch - In Support of Captain Bridget Clinch and Pharaoh Kat follows up with some awesome activism in Supporting Captain Clinch and Why Pronouns Matter
Rachel Hills talks about What gay marriage opponents have in common with gay French philosophers - more then you would think!
Life
The Hoydens talk about Ethics classes to be offered in SRE time in NSW Finally, it looks like this ridiculous double standard is going to end.
Chally shows off her drawing skills at Chally and the uterine fistfight. Uteri and their aggressive natures, tsk, tsk!
Deborah talks about The Treacle in Adelaide.
Media
The News with Nipples gets a surprise in - Diplomats have opinions? I'm shocked
and then discusses the tension between bloggers and journalists in Our own worst enemy
Today in Double Standards touches on the increasingly concerning story of the Melbourne teenager and those photos.
Politics
Blue Milk talks about costuming in Do Not Fuck with Masculinity. Coz being dressed as 'female' is totes the worst thing eva!
Race/Racism
A really thought provoking series by Chally - Cultural Constructions, Part 1 .
Cultural Constructions, Part 2
Cultural Constructions, Part 3
Cultural Constructions: An Interlude
Tiara the Merch girl writes about how people only see her Otherness, which erases her queerness in Exotic Taboo [Love, Anonymously] .
Chally talks on Colouring Perception and how colour is subjective and cultural.
Repro Justice
At A Touch of the Crazy, Stef has a rant on The abortion law in this country needs to change now
The wonderful Hoydens dispel some abortion myths in BFTP: We knew it was bad for you, see!?!
Reviews
The Hoydens strike again in Review: Radical Act
Sex/Relationships
Ally talks about something that is not gross in Some Grossly Indulgent Self Promotion, And A Story Called Gross .
Breast Cancer
NZGirl started a highly inappropriate breast cancer awareness campaign. And it pissed NZ feminist bloggers off - and rightly so. Rachel Hansen asked Should we be asking girls to "get your tits out for the girls"? , followed by Queen Of Thorns says there is only one reason to care about breast cancer, rails against being a "prude" and discussing how the response from NZGirl was, well, less then stellar. At Pickled Tink, Amanda sums up and provides some links, and Boganette points out that it goes on and on and on. Scuba Nurse provides some actual education. At A lump in the road, a breast cancer survivor talks on her reaction to the campaign in Insensitive.
New blogger Annanonymous follows up with some thoughts about the pinkification of breast cancer .
The Body
Definatalie is Thirty and angry and fabulous, darling.
The Fat Heffalump talks about food judgement cliches in Food Judgement or The Post in Which I Make too Many Bad Food Puns .
Queen of Thorns writes on progressive and fat hate in You are actually part of the problem
Shall We Dance? - The Fat Heffalump talks about dancing and being fat, and a beautiful paragraph on muscle memory.
Spilt Milk writes Thanks, Doctor and then, amazingly, wonderfully and so truthfully in All of us (thoughts on fat acceptance) . Just brilliant.
Violence
Over at Geek Feminism they talk about how violence is not the solution to harassment, in “Why don’t you just hit him?” and continue with Harassment and bullying
On rape and rape culture, Blue Milk talks about Why most preventative strategies are set up wrong , News with Nipples provides some scary info on Police and rape myths, Stef talks about rape blame and Queen of Thorns does some signal boosting.
And last but not least, "Harriet J's call out against Naomi Wolf's Assange fuckery" in Dear Second and Third Wave Feminists With Publicly Recognizable Names
Thanks for stopping by everyone!
This concludes this edition! Submit your blog article to the next edition of Down Under Feminists carnival using our carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.
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