“Why Society Still Needs Feminism Because to men, a key is a device to open something. For women, it’s a weapon we hold between our fingers when we’re walking alone at night. Because the biggest insult for a guy is to be called a “pussy,” a “little bitch” or a “girl.” From here on out, being called a “pussy” is an effing badge of honor. Because last month, my politics professor asked the class if women should have equal representation in the Supreme Court, and only three out of 42 people raised their hands. Because rape jokes are still a thing. Because despite being equally broke college kids, guys are still expected to pay for dates, drinks and flowers. Because as a legit student group, Campus Fellowship does not allow women to lead anything involving men. Look, I know Eve was dumb about the whole apple and snake thing, but I think we can agree having a vagina does not directly impact your ability to lead a college organization. Because it’s assumed that if you are nice to a girl, she owes you sex — therefore, if she turns you down, she’s a bitch who’s put you in the “friend zone.” Sorry, bro, women are not machines you put kindness coins into until sex falls out. Because only 29 percent of American women identify as feminist, and in the words of author Caitlin Moran, “What part of ‘liberation for women’ is not for you? Is it freedom to vote? The right not to be owned by the man you marry? The campaign for equal pay? Did all that good shit get on your nerves? Or were you just drunk at the time of the survey?” Because when people hear the term feminist, they honestly think of women burning bras. Dude, have you ever bought a bra? No one would burn them because they’re freaking expensive. Because Rush Limbaugh. Because we now have a record number of women in the Senate … which is a measly 20 out of 100. Congrats, USA, we’ve gone up to 78th place for women’s political representation, still below China, Rwanda and Iraq. Because recently I had a discussion with a couple of well-meaning Drake University guys, and they literally could not fathom how catcalling a woman walking down University Avenue is creepy and sexist. Could. Not. Fathom. Because on average, the tenured male professors at Drake make more than the tenured female professors. Because more people on campus complain about chalked statistics regarding sexual assault than complain about the existence of sexual assault. Priorities? Have them. Because 138 House Republicans voted against the Violence Against Women Act. All 138 felt it shouldn’t provide support for Native women, LGBT people or immigrant women. I’m kind of confused by this, because I thought LGBT people and women of color were also human beings. Weird, right? Because a girl was roofied last semester at a local campus bar, and I heard someone say they think she should have been more careful. Being drugged is her fault, not the fault of the person who put drugs in her drink? Because Chris Brown beat Rihanna so badly she was hospitalized, yet he still has fans and bestselling songs and a tattoo of an abused woman on his neck. Because out of 7 billion people on the planet, more than 1 billion women will be raped or beaten in their lifetimes. Women and girls have their clitorises cut out, acid thrown on them and broken bottles shoved up them as an act of war. Every second of every day. Every corner of the Earth. Because the other day, another friend of mine told me she was raped, and I can no longer count on both my hands the number of friends who have told me they’ve been sexually assaulted. Words can’t express how scared I am that I’m getting used to this. Because a brief survey of reality will tell you that we do not live in a world that values all people equally and that sucks in real, very scary ways. Because you know we live in a sexist world when an awesome thing with the name “feminism” has a weird connotation. Because if I have kids someday, I want my son to be able to have emotions and play dress up, and I want my daughter to climb trees and care more about what’s in her head than what’s on it. Because I don’t want her to carry keys between her fingers at night to protect herself. Because feminism is for everybody, and this is your official invitation.”— Caitlin O’Donnell, Drake University. (via on-another-note)
I was apparently a midwife or something and was delivering babies. In the dream I always wore a hankerchief and goggles like I was at a protest in oakland because sometimes people sometimes surprise gave birth to these giant bug grub horrors and all this powder that burned your eyes would come out. Also, apparently men could give birth from not-vaginas in this dream. WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON IN MY BRAIN.
Also, according to the dream, to become a midwife, you just need an older black woman like Mother Abigail from the Stand to touch you on the shoulder because that’s how I learned.
It was amazing and weird. And when people gave birth to their … Grubs, they kept then and were happy, but I don’tknow what they were called. I said to one woman “aww it looks like you have a ksssssshhhhhhh (radio static noise).”
WEIRD WEIRD WEIRD WEIRD WEIRD
Matt Rooney: I'm not optimistic. -
With the imminent purchase of Tumblr by Yahoo! - I find I can summon little optimism about the service’s future. Marissa Mayer may still be considered “new blood” - but I’m assuming the people tasked to execute whatever vision she has for the company will most likely do it in the same awkward,…
[video]
Waarschijnlijk een van de oudste vormen van hoogbouw in de wereld, Dar Al-Hajar bij het plaatsje Souk Al Wadi in Jemen. Ook wel het Paleis van de Islam genoemd, ook al is het ontstaan van het bouwwerk ouder dan deze godsdienst.
(via Freeyork)
if i win the powerball, i want this.
(via androphilia)
Lately, I’ve been super optimistic about my depression. I’ve had a lot of really good mental health days and it has felt like the clouds were breaking and the sun was shining and for the first time in a while. And then mornings like today happen, where, for no identifiable reason, I wake up with crushing, hopeless depression and I have to force myself to get out of bed and do the things I need to do to get to work and function, because I can’t not function and I have to work and live through these episodes of post-trauma and post-eating disorder depression (although it’s likely this has been an episodic issue my whole life). And then the little things like forgetting to take out the trash, forgetting your work keys at home, annoying tourists, loud noises, power tripping fare inspectors on the train, cops everywhere who could beat you or arrest you at a moment’s notice (notice how the post-trauma bullshit blends in with the depression so nicely…); the things that you’d normally just roll your eyes at, become these HUGE GIANT OMG THINGS that the depression literally taunts you with and says “SEE YOU PIECE OF SHIT YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED IN BED. THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU WAKE UP AND GET OUT OF YOUR SAFE SPACE!” and so on so on so on. This is why I’m thankful that I’m in therapy, that I’m on antidepressants, that I have a really good support network and awesome people in my life to help. In closing, fuck capitalism, fuck the police and fuck depression. Thank you, Love Scott.
please
(Source: bendsinyourbrain, via j4-k)
i LOVE this patch! i got a whole bunch of them for last year’s Feminist Vigilante March in Oakland! :)
(Source: airpunk, via badwolfgrrrl)
(via jjustin)
I have made what may be the worst thing in the history of the fandom. I was going to draw a Sunbird but this thing got stuck in my head. Forgive me.
THIS IS AMAZING AHHAAHHAHAHA
Labeled version. I make a distinction between Elven races who originate from the Aldmer on Summurset versus those who originate from the Elven races of Tamriel (those that would have been present at the convention, and so I call them the “Direnni”)
awwww the Elven family tree!
(via meme4u)
[video]
(via omgcatsinspace)
In the last several years, I’ve found it very difficult to talk to many LGBTQ White people. Everything I learn about LGBTQ experiences is primarily from LGBTQ Black people and other ones of colour. Because I am a cisgender heterosexual Black woman, often times LGBTQ White people approach me with the assumption that I am homophobic, transphobic and theist (where theism justifies the bigotry, as if theism is arbitrary [without history] and only applies to Black people). I am none of these. I’m a Womanist. My feminism is intersectional. I’m an agnostic atheist.
There’s been several times on social media networks (and in person) where a LGBTQ White person started speaking to me with the assumption of homophobia and theism. Once a gay White man assumed the sheer mention of Tracey Morgan meant I defend him. He accused me of homophobia, mentioned that my avatar revealed the truth about me (since in America, to be Black is to be deemed homophobic) and actually hashtagged the word “black” in his tweet reply. For the record, I don’t like Morgan’s comedy; I pointed out how his White audience and White fans laughed at his homophobic jokes, but as a way to punish Black men in general, and uphold White supremacy, White homophobes must be obscured and ignored. This angered LGBTQ White people (others came along) who felt that attacking me with racist tweets was better than recognizing that I didn’t defend Morgan and that yes, Whites, not solely Blacks are a part of the problem of homophobia in this country.
Why would they think racism is the best way to respond to presumed homophobia? Well, as long as this society is White supremacist, media figures like Anderson Cooper and David Gregory continue to push the idea that Black people are virulently homophobic, and Whites receive awards despite homophobia or homoantagonistic policies (i.e. Brett Ratner, Bill Clinton) while Black people are repeatedly and statistically inaccurately portrayed as “exceptionally” homophobic and the “real” problem, White supremacy will not only remain unchecked but LGBTQ Whites privileged in every other area can unequivocally blame Black people for their oppression while ignoring White supremacy, racism and White privilege. His approach ignored what I actually tweeted and was not intersectional.
Another time I discussed media stereotypes and a White trans woman said the media will see me as a “criminal” and her a “whore.” Her response considered my race not my gender and intersectional experience. This isn’t to say that Black women aren’t the most punished and incarcerated women in the country; we are, just as Black men are the most punished and incarcerated of men. But I doubt that she was thinking of women’s incarceration statistics. She was thinking of the stereotype of the “Black male criminal” because I am Black. However, overlooking my experience as a woman, a Black woman no less, she wasn’t able to see how the stereotype “whore” that she thinks could harm her life has harmed generations of Black women and even has hegemonic controlling images (Jezebel/welfare queen/hoochie mama) associated with it. I was expected to listen to her experience as a trans woman since cis privilege shields me from her experiences yet to her, I was interchangeable with a Black man. Again; not intersectional.
Recently I had an exchange with a different White trans woman who felt that I derailed her criticisms of cis women by mentioning Black trans women who felt supported by cis Black women. I apologized, as it wasn’t my intent. She didn’t want to continue to speak with me to continue the conversation. However, she started the conversation by mentioning that I was the only woman of colour that she’s ever encountered who mentioned cis privilege/support trans women and no women of colour really do. How do you say that as a White trans woman and not realize it sounds like “you Black women are transphobic just like Black men are homophobic.” She didn’t critique cis White women. She specifically mentioned ones of colour, as a White trans woman. That’s why I mentioned what I did—not to obscure valid critique of cis privilege but to repudiate the White supremacist idea that cis Black women or ones of colour aren’t supportive and cis White ones are. The imperative for me to check my cis privilege (important) yet ignore her White privilege and endure racism (painful) is exhausting to me.
What some LGBTQ White people fail to realize is LGBTQ Black people deal with homophobia AND racism. Will the former write the latter off as automatically homophobic too? I shouldn’t have to be called a homophobe for rejecting racism from LGBTQ White people any more than when I am called anti-Semitic for rejecting Jewish men’s cinematic interpretations of Blackness through a racist lens or Jewish comedians’ obsession with blackface.This doesn’t mean that I don’t acknowledge cis and heterosexual privilege. For example, I see how Black women who are marginalized and oppressed by race and gender (and class, complexion, weight, ability, education, immigration status/citizenship, nation, for being trans etc.) are further marginalized and oppressed when their sexuality is deemed deviant. Even heterosexual Black women, with heterosexual privilege, deal with our sexuality labeled as a deviant form of heterosexuality; pathological, hypersexual and “unrapeable.” (“Deviant sexuality” is more than a label—it facilities oppression on multiple institutional, structural, systemic and social planes). I also listen to and talk to queer Black men about the intraracial and interracial difficulties of navigating or rejecting patriarchal masculinity and the emotional/physical violence that homophobia breeds. Clearly an intersectional perspective is needed, especially in regards to Black women who are bisexual, lesbian, queer and trans. It’s not one that I can always exhibit effectively because my cis and heterosexual privilege have to consistently be checked. Further, some experiences I won’t even have the experiential knowledge (which culturally for Black people is highly valued as an epistemological approach) that some bisexual, lesbian, queer and trans Black women have, so listening to them and not speaking for them is important to me.
When I see LGBTQ Black people without heterosexual privilege like I have, stating the exact same things that I just wrote above, there’s a problem. That’s their own community that they’re being excluded from by LGBTQ White people. I see this a lot, actually, and I feel stress and pain for them because despite dealing with the same racism as them and for some, the same sexism, misogynoir, colourism, classism, and more, and even with stereotypical constructions of my heterosexuality as deviant, I still don’t face the homophobia/transphobia that bisexual, lesbian, queer and trans Black women deal with, for example. While I face one of the highest risks for rape or assault as a Black woman, I don’t risk being beat up just for “looking gay;” something that Black men face in a hetero-patriarchal and homophobic society. (Gay Black men and Black women have a lot of overlap in experiences since homophobia and misognyoir are honestly two sides of the same coin.)
I don’t understand how to communicate with LGBTQ White people if the assumption is that I am homophobic and theist because I am a Black woman, if the conversation cannot be shaped with an intersectional perspective, if White homophobes are always off the hook and if they continue to believe that Black people are “exceptionally” homophobic and responsible for America being a homophobic nation. If the price of connection is me admitting homophobia that I didn’t exhibit, checking cis and heterosexual privilege that I do have but enduring racism along the way as they deny its existence and pretend like White supremacy and White privilege are figments of my imagination, that’s an impasse.
I don’t want the price of dismantling oppression in one area to be suffering in silence in another. I don’t understand how to support LGBTQ White people who exclude and oppress LGBTQ Black people and ignore intersectionality, racism and White privilege in regards to heterosexual Black people who aren’t homophobic and aren’t using heterosexual privilege to silence them. I most certainly do not condone homophobia from anyone of any race, to be clear. There ARE Blacks AND Whites who are homophobic, and this is a problem. And homophobic or not, ALL heterosexuals benefit from heterosexual privilege, just like individually racist or not, the historical, institutional, structural and systemic manifestations of racism, White supremacy and White privilege benefits all Whites.
I know the possibility of intersectional thinking exists because videos like this powerful spoken word performance with a queer White woman and a heterosexual Black woman help me visualize the possibility. Maybe such a possibility will materialize into common, not fluke experiences for me.
(via theblackcommunist)