Graduation

I have finally finished undergrad, and as a first generation college graduate I want to say thank the mother fuckin' lord. More posts to come next week. more posts to come next week. next week.

ROAD TRIP

For the sake of procrastinating the real world, my best friend and I applied for a grant from roadtripnation.com to travel around this summer in his car and interview gnarly people about the choices they've made in life. Warren Buffett, Angela Davis and C. Ray Nagin, the Mayor of New Orleans are on our list, but now that we received the grant (wahoo!) we have the possibility of interviewing anyone. We will be making cold calls later this week (my list is now full of influential feminists and rocking women who've stood up against the man). Our roadtrip will be 4 months long, yes 4 months in a tent or the back of Kenny's car. Our only rules are 1.) To only eat at local places. 2.) To read local papers (so we know whats going on in the area) 3.) to have spontaneous interviews with everyone.
The whole adventure will be documented on our blog through roadtrip nation, but I will also continue to blog here on my own feminist perspective of what I am seeing. We will be traveling the whole country (and parts of Canada and Mexico), to understand American culture and where we fit into this big ol' place. I am so excited to have this opportunity, and can not wait to meet people out on the open road.

Racism and Feminism

The more I learn about feminism the more I understand racism. Despite the fact that this blog is read by no one but I, my thoughts on the recent racist sentiment storming feminism (ok not so recent, more like historical) has got to be said somewhere, and because I am just now paying my dues to the blogosphere I would rather http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifnot rant on a comment thread already filled with over 200 bickering posts. First off, Brownfemipower taught me more than most of my professors at this school I am about to graduate from. I actually am so influenced by her that I could not go up and thank her at WAM because of my nerves (which I didn't seam to have when I talked briefly with Jill and the crew at Feministing). Alright, so I am coming out of exam time hibernation to scream to no one at this hipster cafe I am sitting at that We Are All Racists, and the only way we will be able to understand each other is to talk about it, actually no, white people white people don't really need to say much, we just need to listen to the voices we have silenced (consciously and unconsciously) for centuries. I had unrequited conversations with BFP (and others) everyday, so that when in my African American Studies class last week, the n-word was addressed I, who seldom talks in class, who sits next to the black girls, who digests racism from afar, I spoke. And I wasn't going to, but this dude (white, male, straight) who I thought actually got it because he opened his mouth most days in class and the words he said came straight outta the textbooks. But he said, "There is a double standard with the n*word," and asked why he couldn't use it because he has black friends and they can. Wowza. Well I didn't even raise my hand and told him many of the things I talk about with BFP everyday. To let people in the community decide if the word can be reclaimed, that as a white person you should automatically feel uncomfortable around the word because of what it historically means coming from a white mouth, that silencing a community and trying to tell them whats best for them is today's form of racism at its finest, and then some... Needless to say the white kids took notes and I got a standing ovation from the black kids. But why?? After learning about racism for a semester, why did I even have to speak, thats what confused me the most. Well this was last week, before BFP left, and I told that guy after class to read BFPs blog, gave him the site, he thanked me, life went on. The thing that hurts me most is the fact that BFP was silenced, and her absence only means that more duchebags like the kid in my class will be able to talk without a rebuttal. I am white and have no idea the sort of silence and discrimination PoC face everyday, I can't selfishly ask for BFP back into my life just because she was my educator, but I can say that it will be much harder for me to address my own forms of racism and racism in this country without BFPs voice to lead my way. The feminist movement is stagnant, maybe depreciating, and it certainly is not going to move anywhere without voices like BFPs. But how do you educate or change the minds of those who are only in the movement for book deals and higher wages at work? How can we address patriarchy without addressing racism, classism, ableism, homophobia and all other isms and obias that are only multiplying? The more I learn about feminism the more concerned (ok pissed off) I become. What is this movement standing for?? If someone tells me its to make feminism sexy, I am jumping off the boat. I want to hear the words equality more often. The NGOization of feminism has lead to a malfunctioning movement.

The Streets are Not My Own

These streets are not my own.
I have no right to walk by myself, I have no right to wear tank tops in the summer or let a skirt ripple my skin on a breezy day. I should expect for men to whistle, it must mean they like me. I mean I am intruding on their streets, kings of the castle, these are their moats. The streets are theirs. They run them, rape them and allow me to walk on them when I am a good girl, when I wear my hair down and look like I am asking for it. I think I am always asking for it. You can hate it a little, you can kinda scream and shout, but not too loud, don’t draw attention to yourself, your tits, your words, you’re at risk. Don’t be that woman who swears back, don’t be the girl who talks loud. Just keep walking. On their streets. Don’t fight back. Don’t even think about lifting your sword. Cause when your image doesn’t conform to their standards, when you don’t smile back at their
“hey baaaaaaby’s”
then you are not signaled down, you are
thrown
down, by words, risks, bruises, things that leave scars on pavement and drops souls into sewers. But what if. What if we did fight back, what if we held our skirts in fisted hands, and screamed out of painted lips a big “fuck you.” What if we walked down broken streets with flashlights, kicking pieces of patriarchy, and sexism and just followed our own torch. What if we all decided to fight back, what if we decided to stop worrying about passing their inspection, about size 2’s, and fake boobs. What if we stopped trying to erase ourselves by bleaching, bleaching our hair, our skin, bleaching the last traces of what happens to “promiscuous” girls from our bed sheets, our back streets. What if we decided that our cunts are beautiful, our words are beautiful, long breaths of unhierarchical horizontal air is beautiful. What if we could all band together, like a growing crowd of pedestrians at a street corner, waiting for a long light to turn green. What if we could come together, forget our differences, forgive our history, walk forward to our future.
Well maybe then we could walk on the streets,
maybe then we could make them our own.

Save the Dolphins by Drowning Women.

Wahoo, finally some press on NOT pop cultures dehumanization of female bodies, but NGO campaigns that use female bodies to sell their issue. . There is a long history of NGOs tromping on each others causes in order to gain attention. The motto "all for one, and one for all," has never been the reality in social movements, and in the corporate campaigns of NGOs today, many have increasingly sacrificed women's bodies for their own cause. But NGOization is real, its alive and kicking. The revolution will not be funded, and it wont be sparked by stepping on other peoples fires.

Let it be Known.

There are some things that society has determined as socially unacceptable to talk about, sexual assault being one of them that is the most silenced. But silence is acceptance, and for society to not allow survivors to discuss pieces of their past makes someone blame themselves for this. Jennifer Baumgardner has recently come out with a new shirt that forces society to think about how we discuss rape, or at least to break the silence for those who can't find the words. I am all about the political invested in this shirt, its not about saying I was raped, its that I feel I can't talk about it, so I keep it locked up.

DV and the TV

I have worked with domestic violence for the past year, making house calls, going to hospitals at 3 am, sitting through trial after trial. If there is one thing I can't understand, it is the way the media portrays domestic violence. They always show the most extreme violence, and victimize the survivor. Leaving many to assume that they are not in a dv relationship. I am writing one of my final papers on this for Sex Panics in the US and I can not wait to post what I discover.