something secret

I've been thinking a lot about the objectification of women, and the way in which it is normalized in a misogynistic, patriarchal society. One of the things that struck me was the way in which inanimate objects are very often coded as female. Cars, boats, planes, countries; they're all afforded what I call "T he Royal She. " It seems innocuous, but labeling inanimate objects as female contributes to the idea of actual women  as objects; objects you can own. It plays into the idea of ownership of the female body, and the subsequent "rights" afforded to someone who "owns property." When we make the connection between objects as female, we also make the reverse connection of women as objects. And objects exist to be owned, dominated and conquered. The symbolism of conquering land that is "inherently" female is quite shocking when you think about it. Especially when you consider the attitudes of the people who do so. Early settlers colonized ...

I love Louis C.K.'s bit on white privilege . To me, it's the epitome of what good comedy is and does; it allows us to tackle hard sociopolitical realities in a way that is accessible to everyone. True comedy is philosophy. True comedy illuminates the truths of our world in an objective way, without alienating those of us who might be the targets of that truth. Lazy comedy doesn't do that. Fat/black/ugly/asian/gay/female etc. jokes, don't do that. The one thing that all those jokes have in common is that they boil down to a common idea: "Laugh at this thing/person because it's different!" That's not funny. It's lazy and unmotivated. I know that sometimes people are different from me. That's what makes life so interesting. I don't need a half-assed comedian to point that out. Bad rape jokes are the worst kind of lazy comedy. It's not that I think that rape should never be laughed about. Comedy can and should be cathartic, but making the v...

Unpopular opinion: As a feminist, I take absolutely no issue with gold diggers. As far as I'm concerned, the only grievance they commit is to not be honest about their motives with their chosen partner. People always forget that marriage is an archaic and largely outdated institution that has traditionally been about the acquisition and exchange of property and power between men. More so, women have been the tools of that transaction. Marriage existed solely to allow property to pass outside of a direct familial line. The idea of marriage for romantic love is a relatively new concept in mankind's history. So as far as I'm concerned, "gold diggers" are doing marriage "right". In a society that still largely sees women as transactional property, gold diggers are simply playing the system to their advantage; utilizing traditional practices as leverage against slightly more progressive but still outdated ideals. In 2013, women are still being told  that fin...

I'm super tired of having to say this shit, so I'm compiling it here for future reference. For the last time, the google-fu is strong. Harness it. Use it to educate yourself. I am not here to educate you. I found a way to learn without teachers and so can you. Continue Reading My Brilliance! >>>

I used to think of womanism as an off-shoot of feminism. It was a separatist movement that split from the whole as a way to create a space that better catered to the needs of non-white women; specifically black women. Now I think it makes more sense to view feminism as a subset of womanism. "Mainstream" feminism largely deals with the particular issues that cis/het, able-bodies white women face, and nothing more. That is not an inclusive movement. I used to think that something couldn't BE feminist unless it was intersectional. Now I realize that feminism largely  isn't intersectional on purpose, which is why womanism was born. If you create a feminist space and fail to include women of colour, trans* women, genderqueer women, immigrant women, disabled women or low income women etc, and continue to exclusively pander to cis/het able-bodied white women, you are making a very deliberate statement about who your feminism is for. I do not want feminism that is not interse...

Marriage is a contract just like an other contract. When the terms of that contract are broken, the parties are entitled to either nullify the contract or renegotiate its terms. The only difference with marriage is that in addition to agreeing to financial terms (pre/post-nups) you are legally binding yourself to social terms like love and fidelity. People forget that the idea of marriage for romantic love is actually a very new concept. Way back when, people married not for love, but to ensure economic stability. Kingdoms were joined through marriage to forge political alliances; love had nothing to do with it. A "good husband" was one who could provide for his wife and family financially, because often, women were forbidden from providing for themselves. Women were encouraged to vie for the attention of the most successful man, because that was the only to ensure that their own financial futures were safe. But this is 2013. The "institution of marriage" as we know...

When it comes to hurling slurs at women:  Slut is attacking women for their right to say yes. Friend Zone is attacking women for their right to say no. And  Bitch is attacking women for their right to call you out on it.  Don't be that guy. Don't be the guy who policies a woman's sexual behaviour as a way to retaliate for unrequited affection.

Equality is the fictional top of a really fucked up, cold, hard-to-live-on mountaintop. Men are at the top of that mountain, chilling out, maxing, relaxing all cool, but women are still trying to grapple up the side of the mountain and get to flat land. That is not to say that the mountaintop is awesome. There are TONS of problems! The air is thin, there's no electricity. It's cold, so you can't grow shit to eat; but you can pitch tents, get shelter, stay warm, and basically live in relative safety. All the while, WOMEN ARE HANGING OFF THE SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN. It's not that men don't have it bad. It's that women have it worse, and because we have it so much worse  (hello, hanging off a mountain here) it is necessarily a priority to get us up to the top of the mountain before we can start tackling the mountaintop problems. How can I help you insulate your tent against the cold if you refuse to help me get to the top of the mountain? Not to mention, an intersecti...

"A three-day-old human embryo is a collection of 150 cells called a blastocyst. There are, for the sake of comparison, more than 100,000 cells in the brain of a fly. The human embryos that are destroyed in stem-cell research do not have brains, or even neurons. Consequently, there is no reason to believe they can suffer their destruction in any way at all.  It is worth remembering, in this context,  that when a person's brain has died, we currently deem it acceptable to harvest his organs (provided he has donated them for this purpose) and bury him in the ground. If it is acceptable to treat a person whose brain has died as something less than a human being, it should be acceptable to treat a blastocyst as such. If you are concerned about suffering in this universe, killing a fly should present you with greater moral difficulties than killing a human blastocyst."  -Sam Harris Truer words. They have yet to be spoken.

It's pretty clear that very few people actually understand feminism, or what the intersectional feminist movement actually stands for. It really bugs me that so many people (including people I know) are so adamantly against identifying as feminist, and feminism in general, when so much of the way they live their lives makes it pretty clear that they're feminists. And it's not that I advocate forcibly applying labels to people. I don't. But it upsets me that people who agree with 90% of the same feminist philosophy that I do, will advocate for reproductive rights in one breath, and call feminism outdated and obsolete in the next. Feminism needs a complete rebranding before the pver-arching idea of "hairy lesbian bra-burners" disappears forever, but until then, it's actually not that hard  to do the research, read the theory, and actually understand the tenets of the philosophy you claim to be so vehemently against.

A lot of the backlash over Beyoncé's identification as a feminist seems to stem from the infamous "titty corset" she worn on one night of her famously named "Mrs. Carter World Tour." The rallying cry seems to be that a woman cannot be a feminist when she so willingly sexualizes herself. But is it not one of the basic tenets of modern feminism that a woman should be free to express and explore her sexuality on her own terms without fear of reproach? Considering that Beyoncé meticulously manages her career and brand herself, with an iron fist that borders on delusional, I think it's safe to say that she is the one making the decisions when it comes to how overtly sexual her image is. If for nothing else, this qualifies Beyoncé as a feminist in my book.

Reproductive rights aren't debatable. They're an indelible part of bodily autonomy. They are not up for discussion, in the same way that your right to freedom isn't debatable. As my 20 year old brother says: "What makes anyone think they have the right to tell a woman what she can or can't do with her own body?" Simple, really.

There is nothing inherently wrong with makeup or cosmetics, and therefore there is nothing about liking those things that disqualifies a woman as a feminist. The problem is that makeup has been historically used to police a woman's femininity, and by extension her acceptability in society. The issue isn't that a woman wears makeup, it's that if she wears too much she's a "trashy whore" but if she wears too little or none at all, she's "butch" or unladylike. Cosmetics are just things. Powders and glosses and lotions. They have no baring on a person's intellectual ideology. Liking makeup doesn't make you any less a feminist than liking lingerie does. Being a feminist doesn't have to mean rejecting outright things that happen to be coded as "feminine". It's like saying that women can't drink beer because beer is for men, or that men can't/don't pay attention to hygeine because grooming is for women. It's non...