February 2012
61 posts
Culture Desk: In Defense of Liz Lemon : The New... →
And the thing is, Liz’s confrontations with her worst qualities have actually strengthened her. That’s what so odd about the backlash. This season, Liz is happier than ever—and for once, she’s rejecting Jack’s influence, finding her own bliss, embracing her oddball nature, going on the Oprah-style vacations she feels like taking.
This is an interesting read… I may have to give Lemon...
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The Soapbox: Facts About Rihanna And Other Abused... →
But if you sincerely want to reduce the incidence of domestic violence in our society, I beg you to refrain from judging her. Strange as it may sound, judging women who return to their abusers only makes the problem worse.
Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain →
A response to the Rolling Stone article on Anoka/Hennepin’s bullying epidemic:
Lets get down to the language here, shall we? Superintendent Carlson invokes the phrase “mental health” to absolve himself and his staff from responsibility.
“Mental health” is here being used as a rhetorical tool to shift responsibility for a suicide from the school district to a dead child. Stop for a moment...
My Conversation With A Congresswoman | The... →
While I called it an open letter to Congresswoman DeLauro, I never actually anticipated that she would read it. Imagine my surprise when I received a phone call from her yesterday. Really. My disillusionment in politics was shaken for a moment.
Awesome!
“We owe it to our sons and daughters and to their future partners not to stick...”
– Utah House passes bill to allow schools to skip sex ed | The Salt Lake Tribune
Shorter VA Governor: Women Should be Violated over... →
While it’s great that McDonnell won’t sign the state rape law, the take away from this is let’s violate women in a kindler, gentler way, over the belly, not through the vagina, so it’s more palatable to and draws less opposition from voters. Forcing women to undergo any unnecessary procedures before being “allowed” to have an abortion, is a violation and either an attempt to prevent women from...
nherikabog asked: Do you accept doodle request? T_T
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The Development of Oral Contraceptive Packaging »... →
The pill was the first prescription drug sold in a so-called “compliance pack,” serving as an example of the potential effectiveness of packaging design as a way to encourage patients’ conformity to prescribed medication regimens.
It is astonishing to think that once contraception was valued so highly that we invested in making it easier to use more reliably instead of doing everything we can...
The Development of Oral Contraceptive Packaging »... →
PBS has a gallery of images of oral contraceptives that provides a nice illustration of the way product design can be used as a form of behavior modification, while also needing to adapt to the way people actual use products — or forget to do so, the ever-present problem with the pill.
This is FASCINATING!!
“We cannot excuse this as a cultural tradition. There are many cultural...”
– -Hillary Clinton
Clinton says “culture” is no excuse for female genital mutilation
Autostraddle — Young People Have Good Spirits,... →
A recent Pew Research Center report entitled “Young, Underemployed and Optimistic,” which may or may not sound like the title of your memoir, outlined the worrying impact of our bad economy on young people, and concluded that we’re more sure than ever of our futures and our dreams at the same time.
News | OutFront Minnesota →
In a 5-1 vote Monday night, the Anoka-Hennepin School Board eliminated the notorious Sexual Orientation Curriculum “neutrality” Policy and replaced it with a policy a new Respectful Learning Environment policy.
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Abstinence-only bill gets nod from House committee →
High School students from West High School in Salt Lake City spoke against the bill to the committee saying it would harm their education on sex. One student said their peers are already seeking out the knowledge on the Internet and among friends. They explained that having a teacher authority to direct them in the issues would be a benefit.
Book List Challenge: My Feminist Bookshelf →
babydoughnut:
feministhemes:
These are (in alphabetical order) the books that are either already on my feminist bookshelf, or have a place reserved there. Not all of these books necessarily have my endorsement, but they all contributed to my feminist self-education in some way:
1. The Edible Woman, by Margaret Atwood
2. The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
3. Manifesta, by...
USU’s LGBT center hires new program coordinator |... →
The Utah State University LGBT Resource Center has a new program coordinator. Brooke Lambert took the helm, at the start of this academic semester, as faculty adviser of one of the only resources for queers and their allies in Cache Valley. The former program coordinator, Maure Smith-Benanti, moved to the LGBT Resource Center at the University of Oregon at the beginning of the Fall 2011...
“Epic article”
– - Commenter Lucy
Autostraddle — How Maggie Gallagher Became Maggie F*cking Gallagher of NOM
Autostraddle — How Maggie Gallagher Became Maggie... →
In her book, Gallagher asserted: “We will never find a solution to the New Man shortage, unless we jettison gender neutrality. Men need a role in the family. What men need, loath though we are to utter the word, is a sex role.”
Ouch! Major diss to men there. As though a man could never handle the freedom of independence as women do.
“I want to be free, to express myself. Man up. I want to have meaningful,...”
– WHY IS GUANTE SO ANGRY?: 10 Responses to the Phrase “Man Up” (spoken-word)
Bill would prohibit discussion of homosexuality in... →
“This law ignores the fact that teens are increasingly exposed to sexual messages through the media, technology, and friends,” the Utah PTA said in a statement. “Students want and need an open and honest discussion about human sexuality and the limitations of contraception to navigate through the various messages they are constantly bombarded with.”
The Annual Post About Sexist Super Bowl... →
It’s nothing new. Frankly, I’m just not shocked by it anymore, which is really unfortunate. My “aghast” muscle is fairly fatigued at this point, and it’s with rather a lack of enthusiasm that I post this year’s rundown. Luckily, a lot of other women still have the energy to take offense and, more important, actually act on it–thus
School's Out: Popular Media and the Gay Teen... →
In order to create an environment where youth don’t feel the need to choose between death and living up to “straight” expectations, we need to create a space of greater sexual possibilities and less social coercion. We need, among other things, real education about gender and anatomical and sexual diversity in schools; we need more role models in books, on TV, and in advertising; and we also...
Pink Ribbons: Branding Breast Cancer »... →
The Komen Foundation is known to many primarily because it’s often listed as a recipient of the funds companies promise to donate when we buy products branded with a pink ribbon. But many critics express concern with this type of marketing-as-awareness, and discussions of the “pinkification” of breast cancer and criticism of the policies supported by groups such as Komen surfaced as part of the...
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power, privilege, and everyday life.: some... →
esprit-follet:
Microassaults: Conscious and intentional actions or slurs, such as using racial epithets, displaying swastikas or deliberately serving a white person before a person of color in a restaurant. Microinsults: Verbal and nonverbal communications that subtly convey rudeness…
The 99%: The (Class) Difference Between “The Boy... →
Ultimately, though, The Hunger Games isn’t just a story of survival; it’s a story of popular uprising and revolution. When we first meet Katniss, she’s a starving young woman, forced to break the law to feed her family after her father dies working in unsafe conditions. Her community of District 12 is kept in ignorance from the goings on in other districts because the media are controlled by the...
Autostraddle — Learning the Difference Between... →
…the fact of the matter remains that a reactionary and faith-based community of extremists have managed to make the culture war around sexual orientation so fierce and so bloody that many people, in some places a majority of people, feel like they can’t risk taking a side in it. Not even when the lives of the children in their own communities, the children they are in part charged...
Autostraddle — New Recommended Guidelines Could... →
When they leave middle school, they should be able to differentiate between gender identity, gender expression and sexual orientation, according to the guidelines. And the say they should be able to explain why a rape victim is not at fault, know about bullying and dating violence and describe the signs and impacts of sexually transmitted diseases. It calls for those leaving eighth grade to also...
More on Komen and Planned Parenthood →
The truth is that anti-Planned-Parenthood sentiments aren’t about abortion; they’re about hostility to women, and particularly to female sexuality. Abortion makes up 3% of its services. Cancer screening and prevention are 17%. Since it’s more politically tenable to go after the services utilized by lower-income women who have less of a voice in the mainstream, groups like Planned Parenthood are...
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