Why I'm Not Happy With Ray Rice's NFL Ban and a Call for an #NFLBoycott

I am not happy with the ban of Ravens player Ray Rice for multiple reasons:


1. This should have happened back in July when Rice admitted to abusing his partner Janay Palmer. 


Full stop. Ray Rice said he made a mistake and had learned from it, admitting to assaulting his fiance. For some reason though, the NFL Commission merely gave him a 2 game suspension and told him to get therapy. Only when the horrific video of him punching his partner came out did they take action. 

On The So-Called "Choice" of Wearing Make Up

To couch the choice of wearing not not wearing make-up in the feminist language of the empowered's woman "choice" does us a disservice. It makes it seem that there are no cultural or societal expectations around appearance and use of make-up - a laughable notion. 

I didn't wake up feeling completely neutral about how my face looks today, and think "hmmm I think I'll have some fun with that new eye shadow of mine today" or, alternatively, "no, I don't really feel like make-up today, I won't wear any." This is not how women are allowed to think. We are bombarded with messages from birth on what we should look like, the appearances we should aspire to, and are systematically taught by ads and movies and TV shows that wearing a good amount of make-up is simply the standard, not a choice the empowered makes on days she wants to "have some fun" with her make-up. (What women on TV or in movies don't wear make-up?)

photo: kiagrafia.com

Is wearing make-up really a choice when everything we see normalizes its use and everyday we are told that little is more important for women than our looks? When we are literally treated better when we have it on? 

No. Of course it's not really a choice. 

What Does It Feel Like To Not Think About Your Body?

Today I read a great essay by a writer named Zaren Healy White called The No Woman's Land Between Fat and Thin Shaming. She muses eloquently on the somewhat radical notion that for the most part, she's pretty ok with her body - sometimes she wishes she could fit into normal pants, or that she hadn't given into a food craving, but not all that much, and she doesn't really share those thoughts with others. It brought up something that I've been thinking a lot about lately: how most men have the luxury of not critically examining themselves on a daily, hourly, or even more frequent basis. 

Although the preposterous and impossible beauty standards that all women are familiar with failing to fit into are starting to exist for men (and that's not a good thing), for the most part, men escape the brunt of mental energy and emotional toll that self loathing for one's own body takes. 

These thoughts usually come while I'm waiting for the train, idle for a few seconds before I pull out a book or my plug my headphones into my phone. I see a guy who is completely average - possible nice-looking, maybe has a little tummy paunch, maybe is rail-thin, but it doesn't matter. I look this average guy and wonder if he ever feels self conscious about his tummy paunch or his flat stomach but lack of abs or his butt or his chin or any of the long menu of body parts that I feel self conscious about on any given day. 

Something tells me he doesn't. Or maybe he does worry about X body part, but most likely he doesn't obsess over it on a daily basis. And if he does, he doesn't share those thoughts with a friend who would half-heartedly deny that his body part is unfavorable and then recite the list of parts he find unacceptable on his own body, setting off a cycle of self loathing and feeble, ineffective "support" for the friend he's conversing with. Men's body issues do exist, but not to the extent that women's do. Women are conditioned to loath their bodies, to obsess over the smallest of our "flaws," to the point where reaching a place where you're mostly ok with your body, as Zaren Healy White writes about, is a state worthy of celebration.

I make no claims that all men find themselves perfect - far from it - but as a whole, I'm comfortable stating that men aren't conditioned to examine their bodies on a daily basis and spend mental energy thinking about the parts they don't like. And I often wonder how that must feel. How does it feel, average-bodied guy on the train platform, to shower and get dressed in the morning without thinking about how your butt doesn't look the way you want it to look, or how you can't wear a certain shirt with certain jeans because it's too tight and will reveal parts of you you find unacceptable, to weigh your clothing choice in terms of how much want to worry about your stomach throughout the day? How does it feel to brush your teeth without thinking about how you wish to god your neck and chin were slimmer? What is it like to go a whole morning without these thoughts? A day? A week, even, before you take the time to unfavorable consider your body? What does it feel like to go for a long period of time not thinking about the appearance of your body at all, but to have the privilege of only thinking about it in terms of your fitness, or being hungry, or bandaging a cut? What does that feel like? 

I hope someday I know. 

Thank You Target, for Helping Me Understand Unrealistic Beauty Standards with Your Bizarre Photoshopping Snafu

You may have seen these photos from Target's website, where a Junior's swimsuit model was bizarrely photoshopped. (Shout out to The Ethical Adman, who first spotted it.) Here's the full ad:

At first glance, it looks kind of normal, minus her incredibly long, thin arm and the fact that the place where most people's arms narrow at the wrist occurs a few inches above her hand. But moving onto the important piece of terrible photoshopping: 

A few inches of her crotch have literally been removed, evidenced by the fact that her swimsuit magically continues to cover a portion of her legs. 

What on earth happened here? 

We've been told for a while now that the images we see are so altered and distorted that they present a beauty standard for women that is unattainable. But no matter how much I hear that, read about that, and see cool pictures or videos that illustrate the process, it's still difficult to keep that fact in mind when I see women in any magazine, online ad, billboard, commercial, etc. So I'd like to thank this amazing ad for helping me really get it - here's a whole new standard that is literally, physically impossible, not to mention undesirable and a more than a bit nausea-inducing to really think too hard about. 

And I'm sorry, I know that the square crotch cutout is really the star here, but that arm! That creepily elongated hand!

Thanks, Target. I appreciate you helping me and millions of other women better understand the ridiculously unattainable beauty standards to work hard to create for us so that we'll buy your products. You're the best. 

All These Little Things Add Up

All These Little Things Add Up.

This morning on the train, a man asked if I wanted to sit down next to him. Assuming the best, I smiled and said “no thanks, I’m getting off at the next stop.” He then turned around, put his face about four inches from that of the woman sitting behind him, and asked her the same thing. Clearly uncomfortable, she said no and then got up and moved to the other side of the train. A few minutes later, the man stood up. I moved aside to let him pass me, but he moved with me, and pushed against me despite the fact that the train was not crowded and there was absolutely no need to touch me at all to get through the aisle.

This incident in itself is not a big deal. Things happen, right? People are rude sometimes. Whatever.

But when things like this happen every single day, it starts to add up. Seemingly little things like this are things that women experience on a daily basis. Yesterday I was waiting for my coffee in the café across the street from my office building when a male employee asked me to move and wait somewhere else. Only his way of “asking” was to put his hand on my waist and push me forward, then to say “can you go wait over there?”

It’s only 9:30 in the morning. There are still be plenty of opportunities today for men to make me feel like my body is public property, to make it clear that my feelings of personal space don’t matter. They will touch me without my consent in a way that makes me feel very uncomfortable. They will not pretend to try a verbal request first, nor will they apologize.

Radical, Authentic Consent

The real-life story of Alice tells about a man who would not ask for sex from his girlfriend in any physical or verbal way, but instead did something revolutionary: wait for her to ask.

This essay will be longer than usual, as I'm going to attempt to describe something that I call "authentic consent," a concept that came about as a result of Alice's story.

Feminists have done a lot of work to redefine what consent means. A quick summary: consent is often thought of and described as simply not saying "no." Popular culture is very focused on the fact that a woman saying "no" to a man who asks if she wants to engage in a sexual act (or, more often, just begins the act) signifies that she is not consenting. This is a good start, but it doesn't go nearly far enough. Feminists have helped to define a vision that goes further: that simply not saying "no" does not equal a "yes" and that the "yes" must be freely given, meaning that it can't come about because the woman is drunk, on drugs, mentally disabled, a child, or being pressured in some way (like being blackmailed or threatened with some type of consequence if she doesn't perform the act). Clearly, a freely given yes is important, as a yes that is not freely given isn't really a yes at all.

I want to go beyond this more enlightened view of consent and explore the notion of pressure beyond the obvious aspects of coercion through something like blackmail or a favor done with sexual acts as the payment. For simplicity's sake, I'm going to only refer to pressure for sexual intercourse and not other sexual activities, and I recognize that the heterosexual, cisgender example that I use is limiting.

Here's a review of the three boyfriends Alice had throughout college who informed her views on consent:

My Letter to X-Sport Fitness

Hello,

Please cancel my membership with X-Sport Fitness. My ID number is xxxxxxxx.

I would like to note that the reason I am leaving is because I do not feel that the Belmont location in Chicago that I have been going to is a safe and supportive space for women. I was nearly constantly pushed to do personal training and was told that my BMI, which is the “good” range, could be “a lot better” and was asked multiple times how many inches or pounds I wanted to lose. Despite the fact that when I originally signed up I continually expressed that I had been exercising for a long time and was not there to lose weight  but merely to maintain fitness during the winter, I was pushed for nearly an hour to sign up for personal training. Despite my requests not to call or text me about personal training, I received numerous texts and calls until I finally angrily told a trainer not to call me anymore about the free hour of training.

I understand that this is how the personal trainers earn their income, but their pushiness was extremely unwelcomed, and their tactic seemed to be simply to make me feel so insecure about my body that I would give into the offer for personal training. I would like to note that my husband has experienced nowhere this amount of pressure and harassment from the staff.

I hope that in the future, X-Sport Fitness will become a place that does not view shaming women about their bodies as an acceptable means of gaining profit. I hope that I will be able to return to this gym, which has very nice equipment and is just down the block from my house, to work out rather than traveling across town to exercise someplace where I do not feel judged for the fact that I my BMI is in the healthy range and I am not underweight. I hope that X-Sport Fitness will become a place where women are not asked about how many inches or pounds they’re trying to lose, but rather how they want to feel, and that when our answers are “no,” we are heard and respected and not shamed into saying “yes.” I hope that it becomes a place where all people, no matter what they look like, what their BMI is, or what their goals are, feel welcome, accepted, and supported.

Please cancel my membership.

Best,

Eva PenzeyMoog

Chicago, IL

penzeymoog@gmail.com

A Story: The Guy Who Refused To Get Consent

This is a special guest edition written for a friend who wishes to share her story but remain anonymous. It will be followed by another essay about authentic consent (in which I will call her "Alice"). If anyone would ever like to share a story or viewpoint (anonymous or not, written by yourself or told to me to write for you) please don't hesitate to get in touch!

***

Like most American women, my view of consent was both progressive and terribly dated at the same time. I was informed about rape, I knew how to forcefully say "no" and was more than comfortable doing so, and had a handful of pleasant hookups and minor relationships under my belt by the time I had my first real boyfriend in college. He was incredibly attractive and all through our short-lived relationship, I simply felt lucky that he wanted to be with someone like me - attractive enough but not anywhere close to his muscular, careless beauty. He was kind and sensitive and I give him the benefit of the doubt that no one taught him about what real, authentic consent meant.

image: fem2pt0.com

It would go like this: we'd start making out, and it would get progressively more intense, until he put his hand to my pants and would begin to unbutton them. I'd put my hand on his and move it away. He would never try twice in one night - what a great guy, I thought. There was no verbal communication, and consent to him simply looked like my non-verbal hand-moving "no," instead of a loud verbal "yes." This happened for a while until one night I decided I was ready for my first below-the-belt experience and didn't push his hand away. It felt wonderful and terribly uncomfortable at the same time, and we didn't talk about it afterwards. He never asked me how I was doing, if what he was doing felt good, or what he could do better. I started to get him off with my hands, but he never succeeded in doing the same for me. I didn't have the language to express my feelings of frustration and a nagging sense that this wasn't equal and therefor wasn't right. No one had ever taught me to advocate for my own pleasure, and I certainly hadn't seen it in any of the TV shows, movies, or songs that largely educated my view of sex.

Why we're actually upset about The Biggest Loser's Rachel Fredrickson

You've probably heard some of the media outcry over The Biggest Loser's Rachel Fredrickson's weight loss. She dropped from 260 pounds to 105 pounds, losing 60% of her body fat. It's caused a lot of people to wake up about the show's dangerous message: that fat shaming is acceptable and even encouraged and that the ends justify the means - even when those means involve dangerous dehydration, brain-washing, and eating disorder mentalities. 

Biggest Loser winner Rachel Fredrickson

But I don't think the general public is actually concerned about her weight. I think that people are upset with being forced to come face to face with what the brutal work that a woman has to do to meet the standards of our skinny-obsessed culture. Rachel Fredrickson has ruined the fantasy that rail-thin women are the norm and that if you're not lucky enough to be born that way, it's not too much work to get there. She's shown just how much work it is. And to deal with this discomfort, we claim that she's too skinny, has gone too far, that we're "worried" for her. But she looks like pretty much every runway model I've ever seen - but now that the curtain has been pulled back on what it takes for her to look like that, America is freaking out.

A Message to Good Men about Consent and Rape

Rape: a horrifying event, a violation of the most extreme kind, a trauma that can affect a survivor for years and years. Most people understand what it is, in that upon hearing the word they know generally what happened - a man penetrated a woman against her will, probably with force, such as holding her down.

At least, this is what we've been conditioned to think when we hear the word "rape." We think of a male perpetrator, a female victim, and forced, probably violent, penis-in-vagina sex. But this is wrong, and picturing rape with these specific details is incredibly damaging to everyone. Like most things that are completely horrible, rape is hard to talk about. But we have to. We are doing a disservice to everyone - both potential penetrators and victims and current survivors - when we talk about rape with one narrow definition. One week into my training to become a rape crisis counselor, and I've already had my definition of rape, which I thought was quite advanced, challenged and corrected.

One of the most interesting things to come up has been how men are conditioned by society and the media to rape women through tools other than violence - tools like coercion and alcohol, and how to many men, their use of these tools has been so condoned and normalized by the world around them that they use them to rape women who they respect and want to be good to. This post is about men who rape unintentionally, who want to be good and get consent but have been so affected by our society's rape culture that they don't even recognize their actions as rape.

Please note, this is not all people who rape - there are many perpetrators who rape with full knowledge that what they are doing is rape and do it anyway. Those sorts of people need something different to stop them from raping. This post is about the population of men who want to have consensual sex and rape mainly due to lack of education on how to properly ask for consent. I'm hoping that this post will help more of these sorts of men learn how to do better.

Professional Attire at Work: An Impossible Window

Any other working women out there ever feel the soul crushing task of getting dressed in the morning?

Here's a little background: for two years, I served an education focused organization powered by national service. In layman's terms, AmeriCorps gave me a small stipend for serving (intensive, work-like, semi-paid volunteering) in an urban school. For two years, wearing a uniform was part of the job. A uniform with absolutely no flexibility: the only thing I got to any say in was the watch I wore, two pieces of jewelry, and the things I put in my hair, so long as they were only black. Not a lot of choice in the morning.

At first it was crippling and I felt like my creativity was being crushed, but by the end of it, boy let me tell you, I was content. I saved my best clothes for the weekend. It took me all of 20 minutes to get from my bed to walking to the bus. No thought necessary. I couldn't wear the uniform wrongly once I knew the few simple rules, like: tuck in your shirt. Don't unbutton your button-up past the second button. Always wear the belt.

That was it. No room to mess up. No thought. No worries about if you were being too provocative or not professionally "feminine" enough.

However, now I've graduated from the service position into one of the few open jobs at the same organization. A real job that pays more than poverty wages and has real benefits and requires the deceivingly simple stipulation that I wear "business casual" attire.

Business casual: a way to dress that is simple for men, the only drawback the one type of shirt and one type of pants required have to be ironed. But you know what? I'd take a few minutes of ironing in the morning over the endless worry, second-guessing, shade-throwing, gossiping, double standard that women in the business world deal with.

I have never had trouble dressing myself before I got my first "real" job. I'm mature and confident. And here's a sample of the things that run through my head about my professional attire any given day:

How our apology culture stops us from growing

I'm working on developing the trait of being able to call people out in an approachable, respectful and loving way. Getting "called out" and also feeling loved and respected don't usually go together. It takes a certain person with a certain mindset and certain relationship between the person at fault and the person doing the calling out to make it work. I've tried it many times but can count the number of times I've been successful on one hand.

To know what I mean, think to your closest relationship - probably a partner, best friend or sibling. Someone that you have a relationship of deep mutual respect with. Someone who can tell you "you know, it really hurts me when you do that" and you listen before getting defensive, and actually try to understand their perspective. Most of us don't have many relationships like this - we're lucky to have even one person that we can simultaneously be vulnerable enough to admit being hurt by, and loving enough to tell them so in a way that they will actually hear it, rather than becoming defensive.

Simply hearing "sorry" often isn't enough - like when a partner says "I'm sorry" after a big fight, but you know it's meaningless because they don't actually know what they're apologizing for. And I think we'd all prefer to be truly understood by those around us that to have a rose and a meaningless, if heartfelt, apology.

The reason these sorts of relationships are few and far between is because you have to be invested enough to listen to the offended person's perspective and attempt to truly understand it rather than simply apologizing so you can get past the awkwardness and move on. This is what about 99% of people you know do. Here's an example: you're at work, eating lunch in the break room when a co-worker you get along well with but aren't close to tells a story about forgetting his keys that morning and says "I'm like a blond chick sometimes," which you understand to be equated with being an idiot, at least to him. You look up, push your blond hair back from your face and say "excuse me?" The guy, who is a good and decent person, quickly apologizes. "Sorry, you know what I mean, it's just an expression." You want to keep it going, to ask him why he would say that if it would risk offending someone in the room and get him to agree to not say such things anymore, but you let it drop. You have to work with him every day, and after all, he did just give a real apology and clearly didn't mean to hurt you.

Of course, blonds don't get comments like this nearly as much as oppressed peoples - notably, women and minorities. As a white woman, I cannot speak to the minority experience and will leave it alone. If you're a minority and would like to comment, I'd love to read your thoughts. What I can speak to is what it's like to be a woman and hear things like:

• "God, that woman behind the counter didn't smile at me once - what a BITCH."
• "Why haven't you taken your husband's last name?"
• "Come on, pretty girl, smile! Don't look so sad."
• "Quit being such a tease."
• "All these little pre-teens in their booty shorts are just asking for it."
• "God I'd love to hit that ass."
• "Cat calling is just a harmless compliment. Just accept it for what it is."
• "Looks like Miley Cyrus has joined the slutty girls club."
• "You know how to install an air conditioner?"
• "Are you sure you want to use the drill? Maybe you should stick to the non-power tools."
• "Is it your period or something?"
• "What will you do about your job when you decide to have a family?"
• "I'm not sexist, you're just overly sensitive."

You can either ignore something or challenge it. If you are brave enough to challenge it, you can do so in two ways: the angry way that lets you get your feelings out while letting the other person know what a horrible person/idiot they are - or the way that is kind and loving and meant to effect some change in the offender rather than make him or her feel bad.

It's hard to challenge it in the loving way because it can feel so damn good to do it an angry and justified way. And anyone who gets hurt by someone else's thoughtless comment's feelings are totally justified. But when choosing to respond, you have to ask yourself: what is my end goal? Is the end goal is to walk away with a feeling of justified and angry self-righteousness, knowing you have one less friend, or to get that friend to truly understand why what they said was wrong and not do it again? The latter is what we want but the former is what normally happens. And that's human nature. But it's time to work against it.

Many people who say things degrading about sex or race - or blondness - are decent people who honestly don't know why what they're saying is hurtful. And if no one has ever taken the time to tell them how they sound and what it does to others, how could they?

"Mercy" film urges discussion of rape and victim blaming

Mercy, a new indie film centered around the rape of young woman and fall out - which including victim blaming within a culture of rape - urges an important discussion of justice, violence, and victims in a society that allows and even encourages rape.

The film is meant to both further promote the dialogue that recent atrocities have begun, as well as explore the horrendous way that such crimes are dealt with by the media. As the website explains:

The incidents themselves are heinous, but the official response to them by the media -- and the American public at large -- is almost as disturbing.  The extent to which victims of sexual assault are shamed and ostracized for speaking up speaks volumes about the way our culture perceives rape.  And we are of the firm belief that this needs to change.

Needless to say, an incredibly important movie is being made. I've written on these issues before, and a film will hit home the very real way that rape affects people - probably in a way that will be extremely uncomfortable and downright painful. And that's a good thing.

Marissa Mayer looked girly and submissive in Vogue - but that's not the problem.

photo: Vogue

You may have seen the recent picture of Marissa Mayer (right) posing sexily on a lounging chair, all dolled up and wearing heels, in the latest issue of Vogue. Some people say it's a step backwards for women, that a male CEO would be photographed in a more powerful position.

That second part is true. And we should definitely work towards overhauling the societal structures that make it normal for women to be - and be photographed as - submissive while men are dominant.

But Marissa Mayer is allowed to pose in Vogue however she wants. By critiquing her every move, in a way that doesn't happen to men, we are reinforcing the notion that a woman's actions can and should be policed. The idea of policing a woman's actions takes lots of forms - saying a friend's shirt is too provocative, that a drunk woman on the street probably should be more careful, that a powerful female CEO's appearance in a magazine should follow a specific set of standards. These things are all policing a woman's looks and, because actions go into making up how you look, their actions.

When we police a woman's appearance, we are telling her that her body does not belong to her. When you say that a woman shouldn't be wearing something or looking a certain way, you send the message that you know what she should do, that you know what's best for her, that you should have the power to make her decisions - in essence, that you - perhaps representing societal norms as a whole - own her.

We can hate on Marissa Mayer for her hit and miss workplace policies,but to hate on her for how she chooses to appear in a photograph is different. I work hard to not police the actions of other women, even if I think I'm doing it for the "right" feminist reasons. I don't try to convince my engaged friends to keep their last names like I did if they like the idea of a new last name from the man they love. If my family members are able and willing to be stay-at-home moms, more power to them. And if a good friend wants to wear a shirt that shows her cleavage, I'm not going to police her actions and "warn" her that her shirt might give men the wrong idea or something like that, because it's up to the men around her not to perceive her shirt as an invitation. 

This is also why I'm not going to say anything about Marissa Mayer's photograph in Vogue. If getting dolled up and doing what the professionals at Vogue told her to do is what made her feel comfortable appearing in one of the most famous publications on the planet, then fine. I have my personal opinions about what it all means in the grander scheme of things, but I'm not going to police the actions of one individual woman making her own choices - that's easy to do but ultimately ineffective and creating any change. Instead, I'm going to work harder against the things that matter on a larger scale. I'm going to make sure I'm not quiet and submissive in my workplace, even when that feels like the safe thing to do. I'm going to focus my efforts on not letting my husband be the default decision maker, which for whatever messed up reasons sometimes feels like the natural thing to both of us. I choose to wear minimal or no make up so that worry a little less about if I'm getting somewhere because of my appearance rather than my abilities. These are my choices, and they reflect where I am at my part of the journey and work towards equality. But other woman are in different places, have different comfort levels, and feel differently about these issues, and that's ok.

Recently a teenage family member I was spending a few days with asked me if a shirt that was somewhat see-through was "ok" to wear out. I said "if you're comfortable it's fine by me" even though I wanted so badly to tell her that she wasn't an object for strange men's viewing pleasure and could she for God's sake put on an opaque shirt? I didn't say this because I did the same sort of thing when I was a teenager, and nothing anyone said could get through to me. I had to endure the lewd stares and comments for a few years before I realized, on my own terms, that I didn't want to dress that way anymore. The decision was and is much more meaningful and absolute than if others had policed my clothing; if my mom had forced me to wear different clothes, it would have been a short-term win for her but I may have changed the second I was out of her sight. Instead, she (usually) let me wear what I wanted, and I came to a deeper and more permanent decision about the way I dress.

The call to action is this: don't police the actions of other women. This is a short-sighted and usually ineffective way to make change. It's easy to call out a stranger for taking a "step backwards" for women everywhere; it's harder but more effective to work against the societal and cultural standards that surround her choice in the first place. Double down on your own efforts. Cultivate a powerful stance and presence, focus your efforts on your abilities over appearance, or do whatever it is that works against the things you dislike in Marissa Mayer that you're personally comfortable with. Think about what you can do, in your own life, to work against the messed up culture that puts one of America's most powerful woman in a submissive and sexual pose for her photoshoot.

What feminism does not equal: aloneness, lesbianism, or man-hating

Feminism can be considered a dirty word. For much of the population, it brings to mind cranky old bra burners who hate on men and never get married.

Just look at Katy Parry's recent rejection of the word as she accepted the Billboard Woman of the Year award - so ironic - or Taylor Swift saying she doesn't believe in "guys versus girls."

Now Taylor, I love your music, but you're hitting on a misinformed belief about feminism commonly held by women in our age group: guys versus girls.

Simply put, no. This is not what feminism is about. Feminism is, at it's most basic definition, about liberation and equality. Not being better, or having power over men, or oppressing them so they can have a taste of their own medicine. It's not about being a single cat lady at a rally burning your bra because men are evil.

In fact, you can be a self-identified feminist and still wind up married to the man of your dreams - I know because I'm a feminist who just married the man of my dreams. And no, we did not meet at a bra-burning rally. That doesn't happen any more, and in fact, it never did. So put that stereotype out of your mind.

My husband is a man who is on his way to becoming a chef, loves pit bulls, hip hop music, and scary movies. He grew up in a typical household in Wisconsin without any notable hardcore feminists around him. He dated girls in high school and college, met yours truly at the age of 21, and proposed to her in typical proposal fashion a year and a half later. He's never identified as a feminist, but obviously I see it in him or I wouldn't be here today, sitting on a couch in the apartment we share on Chicago's west side. When we talked about him being a feminist, he listened to what I had to say and then said "yeah, I suppose I am a feminist then."

Like it was no big deal.

Because guess what? It isn't. You can be a feminist and still date cool guys. You can be a feminist and wear a bra, wear make up, have "girl talk" with your friends, and be heartbroken over a breakup.

the summer I became a feminist

I wasn't born a feminist. Rather, it has evolved over time. Specifically, a switch went off in my head during the summer after my junior year of college, during one really hot (temperature-wise) seven week period of working at a summer program for high schoolers.

There was a heat wave in New Haven and despite all the great things about Yale being one of the world's most prestigious universities blah blah blah, their dorms do not have air conditioning. As an instructor/RA at the summer program being hosted there, I was contractually bound to sleep in a boiling little room on the second floor, peruse the Quad in search of kids heat-resistent enough to play four square, and roam around New Haven during their free time just to make sure they were being resepectful in the stores and restaurants. Needless to say, other than the few hours I spent in air-conditioned classrooms teaching, I was by default hot, sweaty, and irritated.

It was that heat that got me out of my comfort zone and into the realization there there was more to me than a prettily made up face.

City Year, Diversity, and Trayvon Martin

This a bold statement, but I'm going to make it: if everyone did a City Year, the Trayvon Martin tragedy wouldn't have occurred.

This is a departure from my usual focus on action-oriented feminism, but it's a departure I feel obliged to make. There are so many reasons why national service should be a part of every young person's life, but they are often discussed in the abstract. This is an opportunity for what I believe is a real-life, concrete example.

City Year is a national education-focused non-profit organization that does work in closing the achievement gap and is powered by AmeriCorps. Young idealists sign on for a year of full-time service in urban schools, serving students who are slipping through the cracks and run the risk of not having the skills necessary to graduate high school. Please note that I do not represent City Year Inc. and everything written here are my words and views, and not those of the organization.

As I'm sure you can guess, this puts City Year Corps Member in contact with a whole lot of diversity. Not only does the organization do an incredible job maintaining a diverse Corps in each of the 25 cities it serves, but the public partner schools are usually either racially diverse or mainly made up of minorities. For someone like me - a white, suburban woman of middle class Wisconsin - it was the first time I had meaningful contact with a diverse population.

Why More Men Having Plastic Surgery Does Not Equal Gender Equality

photo: prweb.com

While on a flight back from a work conference in Boston, I realized the limitations of my new Nook, other than being among the least sexy, if most useful, of my wedding presents: you can’t read during take-off and landing. Desperate, I picked up an in-flight magazines called American Way. And between the articles about people who dress up like mermaids and Armie Hammer was a piece titled “Nip/Tuck Secrets: Plastic Surgery AMONG MALES is booming, but it’s not one of those things guys want to discuss.”

Having recently read an amazing book titled “Beauty Junkies” by Alex Kuczynski, about America’s addiction to plastic surgery and cosmetic enhancement (non-surgical procedures like Botox injections), I was intrigued. The article starts off with the story of code name Brian, who had a surgery to give him a stronger-looking chin and is quoted saying “vanity these days is not just for women…I hate to say it, but I think a lot of people do judge you based on how you look. This is something for myself, not anybody else.”

Oh really? Before I move onto all the other seriously flawed statements in this article, of which there are plenty, I want to address the notion of plastic surgery being done “for myself, not anybody else.”

The Iowa Supreme Court and one "irristible" dental assistant

In case you missed it under the news of George Zimmerman's trial and the Asiana plan crash, the upheld it's previous ruling that it was lawful for a man to fire his dental assistant for being "irresistible." The woman in question, Melissa Nelson, was a dental assistant who has the misfortune of being attractive to her boss. The court found that Melissa Nelson's termination did not amount to discrimination, and that it was over a matter of a personal relationship, and not gender bias.

The Sacramento Bee sums it up nicely: "The all-male court found that bosses can fire employees they see as threats to their marriages, even if the subordinates have not engaged in flirtatious or other inappropriate behavior. The court said such firings do not count as illegal sex discrimination because they are motivated by feelings, not gender."

A Case Against the TV: Women and Consumerism

photo: jamesmaystock.com

While reading the mind-melting, life-changing book The Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard, an expert in international sustainability and environmental health issues, I thought a lot about the impact of our consumer-driven way of life on women specifically. In chapter 4, Consumption, she details out some of the more familiar parts of the story of Stuff: how advertising plays with our heads and gets us to buy more junk while we engage TV watching (one of our favorite pastimes), how we have to work more to have the money to buy this Stuff, and how the bulk of it is completely and utterly useless brickabrack that ends up either in a landfill or collecting dust in your closet. (She calls this the "work-watch-spend" cycle, and it's a treadmill most of us live on for much of our lives.)

I spent a good few years on that treadmill myself. I'm not here to explain to you how our economy was engineered so that we would work a ton, have too much junk, and completely and totally ruin the earth for our children and how we can fix it - to learn about that, pick up The Story of Stuff. (Ideally from a library or used book store. It really is a great read.) What I am here to explain to you is how I was a slave to the work-watch-spend cycle, and how I - inadvertently, I'll admit - managed to take break free and what it has done for me in terms of my self-image and confidence.

It goes like this: TV commercials market beauty products to young women. Over half - 56% - of commercials during shows with a high viewer population of young women focus on appearance. Compare that to just 3% of commercials aimed at men.