Yesterday marked the 90th anniversary of the passing of the 19th amendment – you know, that little law that gave women the right to vote.  There were some great posts celebrating this fact, as well as critiquing the methods and shortcomings of the heroines that fought for our rights.  A good feminist is always critical and willing to take a look at where we need to improve, so I send out kudos to all of those women out there who continue to fight the battles within while striving to foster an effective and efficient sisterhood.

Shoutouts to feministing for the awesome old school vid!

Young Women and the Battle for Women Suffrage [the ms. education of shelby knox]

‘Battle’ is the correct word to describe the 100-year campaign to get women the right to vote. Sadly, many American school children never learn about the courageous activism waged by the many women and men of all races it took to make the 19^th amendment the law of the land. If they get any information on the topic at all, they leave the classroom thinking Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton simply asked for the vote and it was kindly granted! The lack of women’s history education in schools leaves young women without a true understanding of all the women have done and become before, making it harder to do and become today.

Ahh intentions.  Maybe it’s a pessimism/optimism thing.  You know, glass half empty, glass half full; people are inherently good, people are inherently dipshits evil.  I try to give the benefit of the doubt, and I’m certain that I don’t always do this when I should, and sometimes I do it when I shouldn’t.  But I really do try to work from the assumption that most people don’t mean any harm and that a fair amount of what is perceived as malice is often just ignorance.  Ignorance is something that is easier to modify than intentional cruelty.

Take it from Rabbit Lord of the Undead:

You harbour racist beliefs and assumptions. This, by itself, is not actually your fault and says nothing one way or another about you as a person except you live in a society filled with racist images and texts. It would be remarkable if you didn’t absorb at least some of what your environment has to teach you.

So what can we do about it?

Non-white people have been writing about their experiences for a long time and their writings are widely available. Find them. Read them. And always, always understand that a person who is sharing their lived experience with you is giving you a gift. It’s their life. Sharing it with you puts them in an incredibly vulnerable position. It’s not a philosophical point about which reasonable people can reasonably disagree and it’s not a debate topic…  Try to not fuck up. When you do apologise. Understand what it is you are apologising for (and it’s not ‘I’m sorry if you were offended by my completely harmless words’). Work on becoming a person who can be trusted by people who have had their trust shattered every day of their lives.

Rabbit’s post is about understanding white privilege – and this is clearly an important area in which to understand your own privilege – but there are countless other areas in which this advice fits.  We all hold some types of privilege, and we all have enormous gaps in our understanding of the experiences of others.  We all say stupid things and hurt people.  Hopefully, this usually happens unintentionally and we can genuinely listen to feedback, learn from it, and do better next time.  But just because we are trying doesn’t mean that we have earned a free ride.

One of the first rules of interacting with a group you hold privilege over is to remember that they have no reason to trust you. Not because you, personally, are a bad person, but because there is a history with people like you and the group you are interacting with. In the case of Nice Guys, that’s a complex and long and very sordid history.

s.e. smith has a great discussion of this in terms of Nice Guys and feminism over at this ain’t livin’:

Here’s the thing about Nice Guys. They want to tell you that they are different from everyone else. They are more understanding. They identify as feminist. They are not like those other men. And, apparently, we are supposed to magically be able to discern this, even if we have never met someone before, never interacted with him before, and have no idea who he is. Because he is a Nice Guy, his Nice Guyness shines out from him like a gentle light of goodness, alerting us to the fact that he means us no harm.

So what’s my (our?) point?  No matter who you are, no matter what your intentions, no matter what (or how much) you think you know, you’re flawed.  You’re imperfect, and you’re going to mess up.  Don’t try to explain yourself (“You misunderstood, what I meant was…”, “But I’m not [insert -ist here]..”), don’t try to dig yourself out, don’t try to convince the other person that the mistake was theirs in interpreting your words.  Gracefully listen.  Step across the issue and look at it from their perspective.  Internalize that.  Apologize.  And thank them for putting up with you.  This is how we all get better, one encounter at a time.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I won’t pay to see Eclipse so we’re going to have to wait awhile before I review the most recent installment in the Twilight saga.  However, that doesn’t mean I haven’t been reading about it.  Check out these discussions of the problematic themes of the third film:

Racism in Twilight? [random babble]

All throughout the series we are bombarded w/ an image of beauty as white.  As pale, flawless, sparkling alabaster skin as the image of perfection.  Smeyer’s vampires are all various shades of white, and this is part of their perfect beauty, pallid, nigh transparently pale skin.  It glitters in the sun like diamonds.  It is the epitome of perfect beauty.

Being Native in the Twilight Saga and The Importance of Being Sam and Emily… [random babble]

And knowing the stats of Native women and domestic violence, and knowing that they are shockingly higher than other minority women living in the U.S., devastatingly higher than White women, I wonder how anyone could possibly make this allusion in a book and not see the racist undertones that they had created. How they could not see the triggered memories that they might invoke in some people? Emily’s unquestioning acceptance of Sam’s treatment of her…how it is all OK because he really, really loves her… and how anyone could read this and then accuse me of digging for racist undertones to get upset about.

Twilight, tweens, and abstinence [feministing]

Stephanie Meyer wrote a very thinly disguised book about Mormon dating from a fundamentalist pro-abstinence perspective. Her books normalize gendered violence, present their young female protagonist as unable to think, defend herself, or even be a whole person without a man, and hammer home an abstinence message. And don’t even get me started on the anti-abortion, pro-sexual violence, pro-pedophilia mess that is Breaking Dawn.

I love this stuff.  I hate the films, but I love that they have given us the opportunities to have these discussions.  However, it seems like the Twihards and anti-Twihards are always having separate conversations.  It would be nice to find a way to talk about the problematic themes without simply alienating fans of the film and sending them into defensive mode.  Hmm…

The chances of me forking over cash for a ticket to Eclipse is about as likely as me forking over cash to have my eyeballs mauled out of my head by rabid kittens, so don’t expect a review of the film around here until after I can Netflix it in between Ginger Snaps and Buffy (in order to protect me from the crappy mythology and buffer the straight-up misogyny).   However, io9 has a sweet post up on all this Twilight Eclipse stuff, which is full of win.  Here are some highlights:

Why Team Jacob always has to lose in Twilight

Team You Are Not Allowed To Have An Interracial Relationship

Jacob represents humanity, warmth, frank eroticism . . . and an interracial relationship. Though Jacob’s tribal identity has played a part in previous films, it’s in Eclipse that we learn what that means. At one point, Jacob brings Bella to a tribal meeting where one of the pack leaders tells us a story that unfolds in flashback like a cross between Dances With Wolves and Dark Shadows. “When the cold ones came,” he explains, they fought the native wolves. We see a white vampire in European garb slaughtering native wolves. Then when the wolves kill him, his wife comes to their village, destroying everyone in a blaze of fire and imperialist nastiness.

Team You Must Be Controlled By An Older Man Who Hates Sex

Pretty much as soon as they are together, Bella asks Edward if he’ll have sex with her, and tries to get him to take off his clothes. He makes a “yuck” face and refuses, claiming he does want to but that he comes from an era when he would court her and ask her father’s permission to marry her. Then he gets on one knee and proposes, giving her what my great-grandmother would have called a “dinner ring,” a giant, Victorian-style sparkle monstrosity. She says yes, and they hug. Nobody gets laid.

Team Don’t Date The Guy Who Wants Sex As Much As You Do

Rejecting Jacob is a way of rejecting the consummation of her desire. It’s a rejection of the man who finds her unambiguously appealing, and isn’t horrified by his own desires either. (Edward is always insisting that if he had sex with Bella it could kill her.) “Being with me would be as easy as breathing,” Jacob tells Bella. But she doesn’t want to breathe, or even be alive. She wants to remain frozen in unrequited desire, lusting after a man who finds lust disgusting.

Team Choose Not To Choose

Her “choice” of Edward is a foreclosure of so many other choices that go beyond losing a chance to make it with wolf boy. And we’re reminded of this constantly, as if the movie itself wants to alert us to how problematic Bella’s choice really is. Her best human friend gives a speech at graduation that’s about how being young means making lots of bad choices before figuring out who you want to be. Meanwhile, members of the Cullen family explain to Bella how they were dragged into vampirism against their wills, and how horrible it is to lead a life that is so devoid of choice and opportunity and hope.

Flippin’ awesome – it almost makes me feel excited about tearing Eclipse apart, and like maybe it will do it in a more interesting and less stomach turning way than New Moon.  Now go read the whole post. READ IT!!!

Living in the west means that ignoring SB1070 is impossible, and also that I am living in a bubble where I assume that all people are following it’s progress as closely as I am.  As a privileged white woman, I am not following it as closely as many out here.  Regardless of where you live, the color of your skin, your level of privilege, and whether or not you think you know anyone that could be affected by this law, you should be paying attention.  I should be paying more attention.  Because this law, and laws like it that are in the works in other states, effects everyone, and often in ways that the privileged don’t think about.

Arizona Immigration Law Is An Attack On All Women [jezebel]

And SB 1070 actually increases the threat to women facing domestic violence or sexual assault. Why would a woman call the police to report a crime, why would she ask the police to come to her home, when the first thing they’re going to do is demand her citizenship documentation or that of her family members? This law is a boon for those who would threaten and abuse wives, girlfriends, partners and other women.

Arizona’s Immigration Law and its Effect on Education [equality 101]

The bottom line is this: By taking teachers with varying backgrounds out of public school systems and by further refusing to educate students about the cultures that make America the great country it is supposed to be, we are doing our students an immense disservice.  And this isn’t just contained to Arizona.  What happens, then, when these students graduate and take jobs in other parts of the nation or other parts of the world?

Utah Legislator Stephen Sandstrom to draft illegal immigration bill like Arizona’s SB 1070 [examiner]

The bill would require Utah’s law enforcement officers to ask for proof of citizenship if they had reason to believe an individual was in the state illegally. It would also punish business owners who hire illegal immigrants.

When told the bill is racist:

Sandstrom disagrees, saying that the bill will prohibit racial profiling. “Illegal is not a race, it’s a condition so it has nothing to do with your race,” he said.

Get involved.  Read up on this law and its implications.  Tell your friends.  Talk about why this matters and why we need to stop it.  At the very least, you can sign this petition from the ACLU to tell your state representatives and governor that this law is unacceptable, and send your message to the White House here.

“Some of us grew up dealing with racial profiling, but this law (SB 1070) takes it to a whole new low. If other states follow the direction of the Arizona government, we could be headed towards a pre–civil rights era reality.”

- Zack de la Rocha

From NY Mag via Jezebel.  More about the bill here.  Voice your opposition to the bill by signing this petition.

LOST has reached its end, and whether it was a fond or a furious farewell for you, here are some other perspectives on the show and its treatment of (in particular) its female and POC characters.  As I (unfortunately) have not yet seen the 2.5 hour finale, none of these links have any finale spoilers, but other season 6 spoilers abound, so be warned if you were waiting until you could binge on the whole season at once now that it’s over.

TelevIsm: The Numbers–Lost and Race and Death Off the Island [bitch]

Portraying marginalized people in the face of a mostly white slate of network television shows is great, but it’s only a start. Painting these lives comes with responsibility: to not play into racist stereotypes, to create new and interesting portrayals and stories, and to build on the promise of a main cast that is only a little over half white.

LOST Has A Mommy Track [the sexist]

Claire’s most interesting story line was having a baby and a boyfriend. Sun’s most interesting storyline is having a husband and a baby. Kate’s most interesting story line is having two potential boyfriends, between whom she cannot choose, and also a baby eventually. Juliet’s most important storyline was that her boyfriend might have thought for 1.5 seconds about liking another girl so she had to fall down a mine shaft and explode three times on screen.

TelevIsm: The Disappointing Case of Kate Austen [bitch]

I really loved her at the beginning of the show. She was so capable yet so compelling, and she totally seemed to have an inner life. And now she’s just useless. She does whatever the dudes do, or quite frequently, whatever they tell her to do. Whenever she manages to form a unique opinion of her own, it pretty much always ends up not really mattering in the end and being overruled.

Farewell, Kate Austen: We Won’t Miss You, And That’s Too Bad [jezebel]

Austen isn’t the only problematic female character on the show; the fates of the majority of the women on the show are tied directly to the male leads, and women who have been left on their own (Ilana, Claire, Danielle, Jacob’s mother) tend to end up either dead or crazy… Penny’s fate is always tied to both Desmond and her father, Alex’s fate is always tied to Ben, Sun’s fate is always tied to Jin’s, and motherhood is always presented in an odd and frightening way and never seems to end well for anyone.

Friday Night Lights is an amazing TV show, and if you’re not watching it, you should be.

I’ve been in love with the show since about halfway through the first season. I, like many fans, grew a little concerned as the early part of second season brought in some elements that seemed out-of-place, but I chock that up to the network getting involved and since those few missteps the show has returned to being one of the most sweet, gut-wrenching, beautiful, raw, poignant and genuinely optimistic shows on television. While I can try to articulate its awesomeness, however, I know others have already said it so much better…

Read the rest of this entry »

If you haven’t seen mini-doc A Girl Like Me by Kiri Davis, now is the time.  What you need to know is that many years ago psychologists discovered that both African American and white children preferred fair skinned baby dolls rather than dark skinned baby dolls, and described them as “good” and “bad” dolls, respectively.  Regardless of whether the doll looked like them or not.  Kiri Davis interviewed young black women on their feelings about skin color, and the results are a fantastic D-I-Y social documentary.

In possibly related news, a recent study found that supporters of President Barack Obama see him as more light skinned, and nonsupporters see him as more dark skinned.

The more people thought lightened photographs reflected Obama, “the more likely they were to report voting for him in the actual election,” Balcetis adds, noting that being part of a group that has the same political values motivates people to see their fellow group members positively. (The study, which included men and women, did not “have enough minority participants to see how the issue played out among nonwhites,” says Balcetis.)

What do you make of this video and these findings?  What can be done to change the way we view skin color, without taking the “color blind” approach that denies valuable human diversity?

[This was one of the very first posts at feministhemes, debuting on April 26, 2009.  Memories...]

Feminism has become one of the dirtiest “f-words” in the English language.  Although its specific origin can be debated, American feminism’s big break came as a result of the womens suffrage movement in the early 1900s, wherein white American women fought for the right to vote.  Additional concerns, such as sexual, reproductive, and economic rights were also present at the time, and continue to be key issues in following feminist “waves.”  When most people today think of feminism, they tend to associate the movement with women’s rights activists of the sixties and seventies such as Gloria Steinem, Betty Freidan, and their emphasis on the sexual liberation and labor rights of white American women.  Current feminist movements are continuously challenged – many American’s today see feminism as dead (“You can vote, you can work, what else do you want?”), unnecessary (“Third-wave feminism is superficial and only concerned with pop-culture”), or at the very least divided (“Your cause is less important than xyz”).

One of the most justified criticisms of past feminist movements (as well as many modern feminists) is its exclusivity: what about women of color?  In the 1970s bell hooks, one of the most outspoken feminists of color took up this question.  Although it took years, in 1981 hooks published her first book, Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism.  Inspired by her experiences as an African American student at Stanford University, hooks set upon the challenge of compiling a record of the true history of black women in America, unfiltered by white patriarchal historians.

The book begins with an examination of the slave life of black women.  hooks argues that black women were the greatest sufferers from the slave lifestyle, despite the historical understanding that black men were the most put upon as a result of slavery.  hooks explains that historians allege that black men were “emasculated” by slavers, that their inability to “protect” their women was a great loss.  However, she reports that the struggles that black women were forced to endure were much more widespread and painful.  On slave ships, black men were shackled together while black women roamed free on the boats, naked and vulnerable to the sailors.  On land, black men worked long, hard hours in the fields, while black women were expected to work in the fields, in the house, and often in the bed of her owner.  Black men refused to do “woman’s work,” while black women were expected to care for both their men and their owners.  In order to reduce affairs between black men and white women, any child born to a white mother was considered “free,” while children of black mothers and white fathers were born slaves.  In this way, the sexual lives of all women were controlled by the white supremacist patriarchal society, with the greatest sexual freedom allotted to the white man and the least to black woman.

Throughout the book, hooks describes the dual exclusion that black women face in America.  For example, black women were forced to choose to fight by the side of the black man for his vote or the white woman for hers, knowing that either way she would remain politically voiceless.  Later on, black women could choose between the Black Panthers fight for black equality within a patriarchal framework or the feminist movement, which emphasized the rights of upper- and middle-class white women without consideration for women of color. Black women are subjected to sexual discrimination within their racial group, and racial discrimination within their gender group.

Ain’t I a Woman is a difficult book to read.  As a young, white feminist I often felt the need to justify myself to hooks as I read her book.  For example, “I would never do that,” or “This was written almost thirty years ago, its not like that now,” or “But I’m from the north, we were never as bad as the south!”  I felt angry, defensive, and guilty.  I didn’t want to be responsible or accountable for the exclusion of others from a movement that has begun to mean so much to me.  I often wanted to put the book down and walk away, but…  I didn’t.  And as I continue to learn about diversity, race, gender, and politics I will keep bell’s lessons with me, facing the painful and hoping to come through it a better person.  Feminism is a complex and controversial movement, but many young feminists like myself do not see feminism’s primary concern as the rights of privileged White women – we believe that all human beings are created equal and that gender roles and judgments are harmful to men and women alike, across many cultures, and within diverse groups.  Modern feminism seeks to give a voice to the powerless and extend the rights of the privileged to everyone.

To learn more about bell hooks, visit these links, or to purchase Ain’t I a Woman from South End Press click here.