Social media

A few social media giants like Facebook and Twitter have claimed ownership of the term, “social media” and have written the first draft that guides most of our ideas about social networking and about socializing online.  Social media and social networking are vast ideas that are just beginning to blossom – and are doing so on very limited terms.

danah boyd speaks and writes about this, too:

“Give me one other part of history where everybody shows up to the same social space. Fragmentation is a more natural state of being.”

-- From http://www.theverge.com/2014/3/13/5488558/danah-boyd-interview-the-era-of-facebook-is-an-anomaly

Unfortunately, these social network mega-corporations have also had time to figure out how to use and harvest our social information for their own ends, like advertising and market research.  

Part of what I want to do is challenge this notion of megalithic social networking sites by introducing non-ego-centric networks.  In other words, I think there can be non-individualistic social networking -- social networking for the greater good rather than for myself.  We can look at these networks (of our friends, peer organizations, or any variation of any kind of entity that exists!) from a different level -- we can look at them from the perspective of a network and interact with them so much differently than we do on Facebook.  It's a little like social movement building -- thinking about key influencers and power brokers within the network.  It's a little like Malcolm Gladwell's ideas on how things spread and cause tipping points.

I also hold as a core belief that we can be social and use technology to connect us without getting stuck in it and without selling our data/information to gigantic companies.  I'd like to write more about this in the future!

Why I'm not a "pioneer"

I went to an event recently and someone tweeted about it at me afterwards, calling me a pioneer:

World changing pioneers! It's a @women2 @W2citymeetup #FF @activismo, @alizardx, @anadiazhernandz, @arilikeairy, @ArtfulAllie, @Avilesm
— Nicole Lazzaro (@NicoleLazzaro) May 2, 2014

I have a few thoughts.

1) First and foremost, I do appreciate the sentiment and good intentions that motivated the above tweet.  Pioneer generally has a positive slant in our society, so if I can just skim the good connotation off the substance, I will.  I'll take the cream off the top.  We generally applaud pioneers for their successes, knowing or seeing something first, and usually taking some action because of it.  Parts of me certainly would like to be part of this trend-setting group.

However, there are some less-desirable characteristics of the word that I wouldn't like to embody, and for those reasons, I don't identify as a pioneer.

2) The word pioneer, says Google, means:

Though I am part of U.S. settler colonialism, I don't seek to actively reify it.

3) I'm also not the first, nor only one ...probably doing anything.  There are countless people who have come before me and set forth ideas that have lead to my own.  To discount all of that work, thoughts thoughts, the labor, and the individuals before me is narrow-minded and...quite frankly self-centered.

So, nope, I'm not a pioneer.  I acknowledge those who have come before me, those who have helped me get to where I am now, and I am actively against reifying settler colonialism!

My public comment on the Keystone Pipeline

We know climate change is happening and is caused by human activity, namely the burning of fossil fuels.  President Obama has promised us oil independence - let us take steps in that direction by NOT building this pipeline, and instead, investing in energy sources that will sustain us in the future, not cripple us and our children's children.

The United States should take a leadership role in the world by denying industry- and greed-based proposals such as this one and move forward with this country's history of innovation.  This pipeline will only deny the inevitable as there is still only a finite amount of oil shale, tar sands, and crude oil to be refined.

Building this pipeline will negatively impact me by releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, by continuing to destroy and develop Native American lands, and by failing to respond to the sentiments of U.S. citizens, who are vocalizing their dissent of this plan.

Please do not approve this plan - it is environmentally destructive, socially unjust, and deeply un-American.

Shrinking Women

I just ran across an amazing video of a slam poet, Lily Myers.  Check it out:

Shrinking Women

Here's the text:

Across from me at the kitchen table, my mother smiles over red wine that she drinks out of a measuring glass.
She says she doesn't deprive herself,
but I've learned to find nuance in every movement of her fork.
In every crinkle in her brow as she offers me the uneaten pieces on her plate.
I've realized she only eats dinner when I suggest it.
I wonder what she does when I'm not there to do so.

Maybe this is why my house feels bigger each time I return; it's proportional.
As she shrinks the space around her seems increasingly vast.
She wanes while my father waxes. His stomach has grown round with wine, late nights, oysters, poetry. A new girlfriend who was overweight as a teenager, but my dad reports that now she's "crazy about fruit."

It was the same with his parents;
as my grandmother became frail and angular her husband swelled to red round cheeks, rotund stomach
and I wonder if my lineage is one of women shrinking
making space for the entrance of men into their lives
not knowing how to fill it back up once they leave.

I have been taught accommodation.
My brother never thinks before he speaks.
I have been taught to filter.
"How can anyone have a relationship to food?" He asks, laughing, as I eat the black bean soup I chose for its lack of carbs.
I want to tell say: we come from difference, Jonas,
you have been taught to grow out
I have been taught to grow in
you learned from our father how to emit, how to produce, to roll each thought off your tongue with confidence, you used to lose your voice every other week from shouting so much
I learned to absorb
I took lessons from our mother in creating space around myself
I learned to read the knots in her forehead while the guys went out for oysters
and I never meant to replicate her, but
spend enough time sitting across from someone and you pick up their habits

that's why women in my family have been shrinking for decades.
We all learned it from each other, the way each generation taught the next how to knit
weaving silence in between the threads
which I can still feel as I walk through this ever-growing house,
skin itching,
picking up all the habits my mother has unwittingly dropped like bits of crumpled paper from her pocket on her countless trips from bedroom to kitchen to bedroom again,
Nights I hear her creep down to eat plain yogurt in the dark, a fugitive stealing calories to which she does not feel entitled.
Deciding how many bites is too many
How much space she deserves to occupy.

Watching the struggle I either mimic or hate her,
And I don't want to do either anymore
but the burden of this house has followed me across the country
I asked five questions in genetics class today and all of them started with the word "sorry".
I don't know the requirements for the sociology major because I spent the entire meeting deciding whether or not I could have another piece of pizza
a circular obsession I never wanted but

inheritance is accidental
still staring at me with wine-stained lips from across the kitchen table.

Travel 2013: Sexism in india

The oppression of women, or sexism, in India was worse than I expected.  However, I’m sure that several of these things are sexist as I perceive them and may not be perceived that way by the women who live it every day.   I can say for sure, that men make it uncomfortable for women (at least foreign women) to walk on the street.  They stare blatantly and harshly.  This can range from curiosity to something more lustful and scary.   Many times a day, men would walk by staring directly at our breasts and not make eye contact – this is from close range.  There was rarely a time when my sister and I were sitting some place where there were not men staring.  I’m not exaggerating.  For example, in restaurants, often there would be either another patron or multiple wait staff staring.  One time, I counted 10 at once in a restaurant.  On our train ride from Delhi to Agra (a major tourist thoroughfare) 5 men stared as we played cards.

In a tourism book, I read that it isn’t uncommon for women to get groped in public spaces (like crowded markets or public transportation).  Fortunately this didn’t happen to me, but I had the mind to grab some man’s wrist after he tried anything and not just let him walk away freely from it.

Occasionally, often with some layer of protection, like speed (from a moving autorickshaw) or glass (from inside a restaurant), my sister and I would challenge blatant and unrelenting staring.  Once Licia stuck her tongue out at a guy who was staring from outside restaurant and he started laughing as he tried to return the gesture.  He eventually moved out of direct line of sight but still checked in on us.  The last few days, we started saying things loudly to each other, like “you shouldn’t stare,” or “stop staring at us.”  I’m pretty sure it is also seen as impolite in Indian culture, but I didn’t see any Indian women respond to it.

The dress code is different in India for women than it is in the U.S., but that is being challenged in big cities by younger women.  Traditionally, women wear saris (long cloth wrapped around her body) or kurtas and tights or some pants under them.  Their legs were generally fully covered, and often, with kurtas, so were their arms.  And this is in temperatures above 100 degrees F.  Licia and I generally wore dresses with tights under them, so not as fully covered, but still more than either of us would like to wear if we had the choice.  Pulling up tights in 100 degree weather is far from easy or comfortable.  So we felt like we were doing our part to not have our bodies exposed.

And I think the heat made my frustration with staring men worse.  Since it’s difficult to feel any power in the face of the threat of violence and potential lack of shared language, we often felt unable to express anything to the men who were being offensive.  Put that in a steamy oven of 115 degrees that is Delhi in the summer and it feels pretty ugly.  

Responses to NPR podcast on language and assimilation

I listened to an NPR podcast Luke sent me, involving the "Race Card Project" and language and assimilation. Here are some of my thoughts:

• It's an interesting turn when she says "more American...whatever that means" -- at 1:22 - and then goes on to explain what she thinks/knows they meant. She knows what it means -- it means speaking only English or English without an accent, and I'm not sure why she makes it sound like she doesn't.
• "Language of the new homeland, where in America that means English" - I wish they'd be a little more critical here, because an older language of Ft. Worth Texas is Spanish, so in this case you could actually claim that the (a) language of the homeland is Spanish.
• I'd also like to hear more about the labels "hispanic" and "latino" in the podcast. Both of those words were created by people outside of those groups, and because of this, among other reasons, I don't like them...but I realize that many people identify as such.  There's enough effort from outside the groups to create groups in order to control or marginalize them -- let's not use this kind of motivation to self-identify.  On the other hand, the label "chicano" was created from within the Mexican American group as part of the liberation movement in the U.S in the 60s.
• I can definitely empathize with the "internalized criticism" and her saying "I'm not Mexican, my parents are."   I wish she would elaborate on her reflections of this statement now, as "making amends for a deep wound."  Does she mean the wound of not being able to identify?
• I'd agree with this statement, except for "my dad's chicano, not me" - it's really hard to own any of this because being Mexican sucks in this country right now (and has for a while).
• She said her "whole family has regret around not learning Spanish" -- I wonder if this is true for my family. I certainly do regret not speaking more Spanish with my grandpa.
• I wonder why she can't master the language as an academic?  (Those are the interviewer's words, but I don't think they're correct -- more like why she hasn't decided to.)  I wish they'd talk more about her struggle (if there was one) to learn Spanish - does she want to? What gets in her way?
• I recently seen the answer to this question for myself clearly -- that internalized racism and racism were the factors getting in the way of me learning Spanish. Since finding this out, and with the support from others, it's been a little easier to speak it and feel more comfortable doing so lately.
• It was really touching when she answered "what do you lose when you lose your language? home, relationship" - that's definitely true. "Family" is what I'd say.
• Most of all - it's cool to see someone else's experiences that are similar to mine represented in big media. It's going to be a growing topic as more and more latinos/Latin Americans come to and are born in the U.S.

Talking Back by bell hooks

Picked up bell hooks' Talking Back - thinking feminism, thinking black, and it's awesome!

I want to share a few quotes with you that I've found inspiring, and, as an appetizer a Ryan Gosling meme:

• In the world of the southern black community I grew up in, "back talk" and "talking back" meant speaking as an equal to an authority figure. ... To speak then when one was not spoken to was a courageous act - an act of risk and daring.
• There are some folks for whom openness is not about the luxury of "will I choose to share this or tell that," but rather "will I survive - will I make it through - will I stay alive?"
• The history of colonialization, imperialism is a record of betrayal, of lies, and deceits.  The demand for that which is real is a demand for reparation, for transformation.  In resistance, the exploited, the oppressed work to expose the false reality - to reclaim and recover ourselves.  We make the revolutionary history, telling the past as we have learned it mouth-to-mouth, telling the present as we see, know and feel it in our hearts and in our words.
• Moving from silence into speech is for the oppressed, the colonized, the exploited, and those who stand and struggle side by side a gesture of defiance that heals, that makes new life and new growth possible.  It is that act of speech, of "talking back," that is no mere gesture of empty words, that is the expression of our movement from object to subject - the liberated voice.
• [Poetry] was meant to transform consciousness, to carry the mind and heart to a new dimension.
• The insistence on finding one voice, one definitive style of writing, and reading one's poetry, fit all too neatly with the static notion of itself and identity that was pervasive in university settings.  It seemed that many black students found our situations problematic precisely because our sense of self, and by definition our voice, was not unilateral, monologist, or static, but rather multi-dimensional.
• When we dare to speak in a liberatory voice, we threaten even those who may initially claim to want our words. In the act of overcoming our fear of speech, of being seen as threatening, in the process of learning to speak as subjects, we participate in the global struggle to end domination. When we end our silence, when we speak in a liberated voice, our words connect us with anyone, anywhere who lives in silence. Feminist focus on women finding a voice, on the silence of black women, of women of color, has led to increased interest in our words. This is an important historical moment. We are both speaking of our own volition, out of our commitment to justice, to revolutionary struggle to end domination, and simultaneously called to speak, "invited" to share our words. It is important that we speak. What we speak about is more important. It is our responsibility collectively and individually to distinguish between mere speaking that is about self-aggrandizement, exploitation of the exotic "other," and that coming to voice which is a gesture of resistance, an affirmation of struggle.
• While the struggle to eradicate sexism and sexist oppression is and should be the primary thrust of feminist movement, to prepare ourselves politically for this effort we must first learn how to be in solidarity, how to struggle with one another.

Why I love it, a start:

I love how she sees voice as the mechanism to move from subject to object.  From colonized, to powerful. I love to hear her thoughts on how finding voice can be transformative, and how she also is critical of mainstream (white) feminism in that it isn't just about speaking, it's also about the content of what is said.
I love it because she makes me ask the question, again: "what does solidarity mean?"  She makes me want to understand and feel what she means by "an affirmation of struggle" - as it relates to finding a voice.

I love how she presents of the stakes of speaking up/talking back.  It's not a luxury of what to share, and does/has carry/carried serious punishments.  And it doesn't seem like she does so from a perspective of being a victim, which I've seen presented harshly recently.  Rather, she speaks a lot to the courage required and the power gained by speaking against these punishments.

Update, 1 hour later: just saw this on Facebook and I think it highlights a lot of what bell hooks brings up, check it out:

Political Ethnicity

"This tribe called "women of color" is not an ethnicity.  It is one of the inventions of solidarity, an alliance, a political necessity that is not the given name of every female with dark skin and a colonized tongue, but rather a choice about how to resist and with whom." - Aurora Levins Morales

Jose Antonio Vargas on Immigration

Instead of watching the presidential debates tonight, I'm reading this article, something that lets me think about immigration rather than be filled with anger toward the two men "debating" and avoiding answering questions.

Quotes from Jose Antonio Vargas' Time Magazine article called "Not Legal, Not Leaving:"

• I am now a walking conversation that most people are uncomfortable having. (Pg. 1)
• The probusiness GOP waves a KEEP OUT flag at the Mexican border and a HELP WANTED sign 100 yards in, since so many industries depend on cheap labor. (Pg. 2)
• Of all the questions I've been asked in the past year, "Why don't you become legal?" is probably the most exasperating. But it speaks to how unfamiliar most Americans are with how the immigration process works. (Pg. 3)
• For all the roadblocks, though, many of us get by thanks to our fellow Americans. We rely on a growing network of citizens — Good Samaritans, our pastors, our co-workers, our teachers who protect and look after us. As I've traveled the country, I've seen how members of this underground railroad are coming out about their support for us too. (Pg. 6)
• Though roughly 59% of the estimated 11.5 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. are from Mexico, the rest are not. About 1 million come from Asia and the Pacific Islands, about 800,000 from South America and about 300,000 from Europe. (Pg. 6)
• According to the Office of Immigration Statistics at DHS, 86% of undocumented immigrants have been living in the U.S. for seven years or longer. (Pg. 7)
• There are no overall numbers on this, but each day I encounter at least five more openly undocumented people. As a group and as individuals, we are putting faces and names and stories on an issue that is often treated as an abstraction. (Pg. 7)

• Technology, especially social media, has played a big role. Online, people are telling their stories and coming out, asking others to consider life from their perspective and testing everyone's empathy quotient. Some realize the risks of being so public; others, like me, think publicity offers protection. (Pg. 8)
• I am still here. Still in limbo. So are nearly 12 million others like me — enough to populate Ohio. We are working with you, going to school with you, paying taxes with you, worrying about our bills with you. What exactly do you want to do with us? More important, when will you realize that we are one of you? (Pg. 9)

The biggest repository for plastic waste is the ocean.

Read more here, for the 50th anniversary of Silent Spring.

"giving up" privilege

Is it possible to "give up" privilege?  Or, would it be more useful to think of ensuring privilege for everyone?  

In thinking about these questions, an analogy popped into my head: if we all try and "give up" our privilege it might be like trying to play soccer without ever travelling with the ball.  Whenever we were given the ball (privilege) we'd have to kick it away.

This way of thinking (of "giving up" privilege) also seems to suggest action based on avoidance, possibly guilt, feeling bad about oneself, and maybe even ignore-ance.

Additionally, thinking of privilege as something one can "give up" is problematic because it suggests it is a personal choice.  Often, privileges are given to us socially, and not something we could give up.  For example, a (white, upper class, straight) male privilege is being able to look at the U.S. House of Reps and see himself represented (see #7).  How could a man who isn't an elected official give this up?  He could, of course, vote a female in.  And perhaps less men could run for office, or better: encourage their female colleagues to run.  But I'm not sure where thinking of "giving up" privileges gets us in this situation.

Or, continuing, if a man sleeps with a bunch of women and isn't called a slut (#13), how could he give this up?

It seems to me that a more useful perspective that allows for and encourages more social justice is to think about ensuring the privileges we are aware of having for everyone.  We shouldn't have to feel bad about them - rather we should acknowledge them and work toward making it possible for everyone to have them.

For a great primer on privilege, check out White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, By Peggy McIntosh.  I've blogged about this before.

This is still something I'm still working on figuring out, so if you read this and are intrigued...or think I'm wrong...or can help with a next step, do let me know by leaving a comment!

On rape jokes

1 in 4 people.  1 in 4 refers to the number of reported sexual assaults of women on college campuses during their undergraduate years.

This happened. In a nutshell, a comedian, Daniel Tosh, made some sort of rape joke, a woman (COURAGEOUSLY, by the way) stood up and said that, "actually, rape jokes aren't funny," to which Tosh responded along the lines of, "wouldn't it be hilarious if this woman got gang-raped right here."

Then this good article (and several less good ones) was written.

Some key quotes from the Jezebel article include:

• "The world is full of terrible things, including rape, and it is okay to joke about them. But the best comics use their art to call bullshit on those terrible parts of life and make them better, not worse."
• "We censor ourselves all the time, because we are not entitled, sociopathic fucks. ...A comic who doesn't censor himself is just a dude yelling." (*Could be "herself" and "a chick" yelling...)
• "It's really easy to believe that "nothing is sacred" when the sanctity of your body and your freedom are never legitimately threatened."
• "It's like the difference between a black comic telling a joke about how it feels to have white people treat you like you're stupid all the time vs. a white comic telling a joke about how stupid black people are."

The author of the article also has a paragraph that explains the importance of the *context* of sexism and patriarchy that surrounds this joke, by making up an analogy that might help people understand it at some level.

Sexual Objectification

What follows is a nice analysis of sexual objectification with some disturbing (because they're real) examples from pop culture. The post (and blog) are run by a professor of politics. Part one describes objectification and part two shows that "We now have over ten years of research showing that living in an objectifying society is highly toxic for girls and women"
1) http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2012/07/02/sexual-objectification-part-1-what-is-it/
2) http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2012/07/06/sexual-objectification-part-2-the-harm/

 Interestingly, part two cites a study regarding the effects of objectification on political efficacy (I suppose you could think of it as involvement). Here's an excerpt from its abstract:

 "The normalization of female objectification in American culture has given rise to self-objectification, the phenomenon of girls and women seeing themselves as objects of desire for others. ... This research examines the political effects of self-objectification and finds that it is negatively related to both internal and external political efficacy. The democratic implications of this finding are considered." 

A particular quote from the trailer to Miss Representation in the second post sticks with me: "The fact that media are so derogatory to the most powerful women in the country ...then what does it say about media's ability to take any woman seriously."

 Just some food for thought on a steamy Saturday (at least in IL) -- and if you want to continue the conversation or have questions (or outrage!) in response to reading, share your thoughts!

Rethinking development, an inspiring quote

From a reading (specifically: http://web.idrc.ca/openebooks/470-3/) for a graduate level course on Gender Relations in International Development I'm currently taking.

"A speech given by Robert F. Kennedy on 4 January 1968, encapsulates the limitations of GDP as a measure of what makes life valuable:

The Gross National Product of the United States is the largest in the world, but that GNP, if we should judge our nation by that, counts air pollution and cigarette advertising and ambulances to clear the highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and jails that break them. It counts the destruction of our redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder and chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and the cost of a nuclear warhead and armoured cars that fight riots in our streets. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country. It measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

Myths of Corporate Personhood

Here's the short version, for the longer (explained) version, click here.

Text of Belden Fields teach in "The Myth of Corporate Personhood"

THE DISEMPOWERING FOG CREATED BY 14 IDEOLOGICAL MYTHS

Prepared for Occupy the Quad at the University of Illinois, Urbana 1/19/12

by Belden Fields

1. The myth that the corporation is a person with the rights of individuals.

2. The myth that Supreme Court represents a higher interpretation of law that transcends partisan politics.

3. The myth that money is speech; therefore, money spent freely in elections is protected by the First Amendment right to speech.

4. The myth that the interests of large corporations is in the interest of workers because they create jobs and raise standards of living.

5. The myth that “right to work” laws really protect workers’ rights.

6. The myth that government is the only source of bureaucracy that disempowers people.

7. The myth that economics is above moral concerns and the market will always, by definition, result in the greatest good for society.

8. The myth that the United States is a democracy.

9. The myth that the only legitimate human economic human right is the right to private property.

10. The collateral myth that that social security, health care benefits, and pensions are unearned and unaffordable “entitlements."

11. The myth that privatization is always more “efficient” than public goods and services.

12. The myth that the “official” unemployment rate in the United States is accurate and comparable to the unemployment rates in other countries.

13. The myth that the U.S. offers the highest rates of upward mobility in the world.

14. The myth that there is no alternative to the capitalist system that manifests the above characteristics and treats the worker as a commodity.

Deconstructing Old Spice

I live in a house with a lot of people, so there's never a shortage of discussion-generating diversity (of ideas, opinions, backgrounds, etc.) This week I was taking a shower and noticed someone's Old Spice body wash, and I really can't help but comment. Here's what I'm thinking:

"3X Clean Net:" I'm not even sure what this means. Was there some sort of "clean net" that was included in this package? Are they trying to say that you're 3 times cleaner, by net weight? This is just confusing. Or, perhaps "net" means "clean" in French. Looking at this a little closer, perhaps that's it, but I'm not sure.

Next: "Doesn't leave you feeling dry or rob you of your dignity." So, it moisturizes your skin and reassures you of your ineffable human goodness? I'm not quite sure exactly how these two go together. However, one might be able to take a few leaps to assume that a loss of dignity might come from a flowery/fruity scent, which this is clearly trying to avoid, nonetheless providing desirable moisturization...

"Like wearing an armor of man-scent" -- Is this a good thing? So this "man-scent" armor protects you from what, exactly? Also, hat tip to Luke for pointing out that this is slightly homo-erotic, suggesting that a man (presumably heterosexual) might not want to be covered in man-scent, or, at least, wouldn't want to be judged by this type of thing in a heteronormative society.

Finally, "Drop-kicks dirt, then slams odor with a folding chair" Even though I've never seen WWF/WWE, I sense that this may be a reference to it. So now even your body wash is a pro-(fake)wrestler in the epic battle between dirt/odor and...old spice?

Ok, I just had a few questions in response to these Old Spice sayings that showed up in my shower.

Also, I can't help but be reminded of Hyperbole and a Half's awesome segment on making showers exciting again, there are many more hilarious cartoons here.

quote

“It can’t be any more obvious that we live in a patriarchal society if ”feminist” is a bad word.”

Ellen Page (aka Juno)

privilege: a poem

privilege
a poem for men who don't understand what we mean when we say they have it

D.A. Clarke

reprinted from Banshee, Peregrine Press

Copyright (c) 1981

privilege is simple:
going for a pleasant stroll after dark,
not checking the back of your car as you get in, sleeping soundly,
speaking without interruption, and not remembering
dreams of rape, that follow you all day, that woke you crying, and
privilege
is not seeing your stripped, humiliated body
plastered in celebration across every magazine rack, privilege
is going to the movies and not seeing yourself
terrorized, defamed, battered, butchered
seeing something else

privilege is
riding your bicycle across town without being screamed at or
run off the road, not needing an abortion, taking off your shirt
on a hot day, in a crowd, not wishing you could type better
just in case, not shaving your legs, having a decent job and
expecting to keep it, not feeling the boss's hand up your crotch,
dozing off on late-night busses, privilege
is being the hero in the TV show not the dumb broad,
living where your genitals are totemized not denied,
knowing your doctor won't rape you

privilege is being
smiled at all day by nice helpful women, it is
the way you pass judgment on their appearance with magisterial authority,
the way you face a judge of your own sex in court and
are over-represented in Congress and are not strip searched for a traffic ticket
or used as a dart board by your friendly mechanic, privilege
is seeing your bearded face reflected through the history texts
not only of your high school days but all your life, not being
relegated to a paragraph
every other chapter, the way you occupy
entire volumes of poetry and more than your share of the couch unchallenged,
it is your mouthing smug, atrocious insults at women
who blink and change the subject -- politely -- privilege
is how seldom the rapist's name appears in the papers
and the way you smirk over your PLAYBOY

it's simple really, privilege
means someone else's pain, your wealth
is my terror, your uniform
is a woman raped to death here, or in Cambodia or wherever
wherever your obscene privilege
writes your name in my blood, it's that simple,
you've always had it, that's why it doesn't
seem to make you sick to your stomach,
you have it, we pay for it, now
do you understand

Lecture: Race and Whiteness within Vegan Philosophy

I attended two of Breeze Harper's talks as part of the Campus EcoFeminism Summit, an event I am glad to know will be continuing annually. I learned a lot from attending her keynote speech and her less formal vegan meet n' greet event earlier in the day. What it means to be a good environmentalist today is to buy more things: a hybrid car, organic veggies, expensive gadgets. Along these lines, I'll admit: never before had I explicitly considered where race and class belong in the discussion of veganism.

Breeze Harper was the summit's keynote speaker with speech called: “Race and Whiteness within Vegan Philosophy: Critical Race Feminist Reflections from the Sistah Vegan Project.” Breeze's main point was that mainstream veganism has been presented by and for a narrow segment of race and class (white middle-class); many authors don't acknowledge that they are white and middle to upper class. She suggested that many (white) people in the United States have a racial literacy from the '50s where racism = segregation and overt violence like lynching. The view of our society as “post-racial” (“we're not racist, we have a black president”) covertly encourages race- and class-neutral attitudes, and does more harm than good.

Breeze talked a lot about privilege: it's like being born on second base when you think you started at bat. She argued that there isn't a good understanding of how whiteness and racism work in veganism, and many popular books are laden with unacknowledged privileges: don't be a cheapskate, buy all organic foods! (Well, what if there isn't a Whole Foods in your backyard, or you don't have a car to drive to one, or the money to afford their high prices?) Without knowing where we're at in terms of race, class and gender and the historical contexts of which we're a part, we can't see how these things shape our relationship to nature.

The path to addressing these issues will hold anti-racism as a central tenant and include reflection about our own privileges. To learn more about her work, visit the Sistah Vegan Blog. She also mentioned further reading: Lee & Lutz: Situating "race" and racisms in time, space, and theory and Eduardo Bonilla-Silva's Racism Without Racists.

Hell yes, science!

A scientific article:

The Interpersonal Power of Feminism: Is Feminism Good for Romantic Relationships?

Laurie A. Rudman & Julie E. Phelan (Click for full text)

Published online: 6 October 2007

Abstract Past research suggests that women and men alike perceive feminism and romance to be in conflict (Rudman and Fairchild, Psychol Women Q, 31:125–136, 2007). A survey of US undergraduates (N=242) and an online survey of older US adults (N=289) examined the accuracy of this perception. Using self-reported feminism and perceived partners’ feminism as predictors of relationship health, results revealed that having a feminist partner was linked to healthier relationships for women. Additionally, men with feminist partners reported greater relationship stability and sexual satisfaction in the online survey. Finally, there was no support for negative feminist stereotypes (i.e., that feminists are single, lesbians, or unattractive). In concert, the findings reveal that beliefs regarding the incompatibility of feminism and romance are inaccurate.

Keywords Feminism . Close relationships . Feminist stereotypes . Intergroup relations . Gender attitudes

Citation: Rudman LA & Phelan JE (2007). The interpersonal power of feminism: is feminism good for romantic relationships? SEX ROLES: Volume 57, Numbers 11-12, 787-799.