"Mr. Very Important was going on smugly about this book I should have known when Sallie interrupted him to say, ‘That’s her book.’ Or tried to interrupt him anyway."
— Rebecca Solnit, “Men Explain Things to Me.”
Film Review: !WAR: Women Art Revolution
Anyone who lived feminism will enjoy !WAR, but those that didn’t are the ones who most need to watch it. We need to see life breathed back into feminism, see its passion and creative problem-solving made contagious. We need to be reminded that feminism was once cool and, though gains have been made, the fight for equality is not over.
- Because I snapped at my brother after he told a domestic violence joke and was insulted that I didn’t laugh, and then felt the need to apologize and explain it away with a bad mood. I am disgusted with myself because he is the one that should have apologized.
- Because after watching this…
Molly Davy is a student, a blogger and the woman behind local feminist zine, Womanhouse. Her blog (of the same name) is this week’s #FollowFriday Tumblr pick. Click on the picture above to check out our interview with Molly!
(Know of any cool Tumblrs you’d like to see featured on the next #FollowFriday? Email followfriday@mpls.tv!)
(Source: mplscollective)
![Don’t want to get raped? Watch what you wear. This is the advice a police officer gave during a safety talk at York University in Toronto in January. “I’ve been told I shouldn’t say this,” he told the crowd of students and faculty members, “[but] women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.”
Sonya JF Barnett and Heather Jarvis considered the officer’s comment to be shocking evidence of cultural attitudes surrounding sexual violence and our epidemic of blaming the victim. The officer issued a public apology, but Barnett and Jarvis were not appeased. In April they organized a march called SlutWalk in Toronto, with more than 3,000 people rallying to express their outrage.
Since then, SlutWalk Toronto has inspired similar human rights marches around the world. Organizers use social media like Facebook and Twitter to plan these satellite SlutWalks, which have been held in various cities in the United States and Canada, as well as in the UK, Singapore, Mexico, India, Australia, Germany, Finland, Hong Kong, Brazil, and dozens of other sites. The signs women and men carry at the events are powerful: My clothes are not my consent. Nobody asks to be raped. Survivors have been through enough. I was wearing pants and a sweater—was it my fault too?
Heather Jarvis and Sonya JF Barnett were chosen as Utne Reader visionaries in 2011. Each year Utne Reader puts forward its selection of world visionaries—people who don’t just concoct great ideas but also act on them.
Keep reading …](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_luphru0Fke1qap6kyo1_500.jpg)
Don’t want to get raped? Watch what you wear. This is the advice a police officer gave during a safety talk at York University in Toronto in January. “I’ve been told I shouldn’t say this,” he told the crowd of students and faculty members, “[but] women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.”
Sonya JF Barnett and Heather Jarvis considered the officer’s comment to be shocking evidence of cultural attitudes surrounding sexual violence and our epidemic of blaming the victim. The officer issued a public apology, but Barnett and Jarvis were not appeased. In April they organized a march called SlutWalk in Toronto, with more than 3,000 people rallying to express their outrage.
Since then, SlutWalk Toronto has inspired similar human rights marches around the world. Organizers use social media like Facebook and Twitter to plan these satellite SlutWalks, which have been held in various cities in the United States and Canada, as well as in the UK, Singapore, Mexico, India, Australia, Germany, Finland, Hong Kong, Brazil, and dozens of other sites. The signs women and men carry at the events are powerful: My clothes are not my consent. Nobody asks to be raped. Survivors have been through enough. I was wearing pants and a sweater—was it my fault too?
Heather Jarvis and Sonya JF Barnett were chosen as Utne Reader visionaries in 2011. Each year Utne Reader puts forward its selection of world visionaries—people who don’t just concoct great ideas but also act on them.
Utne Reader’s mission is to bring our readers the best of the alternative press: independent, excellent magazines and journals and websites. You might not think that would include a site called The Frisky and billed as “Celebrity gossip, relationship advice, sex tips and more for real women everywhere!” But under the candy-pink veneer hides a true feminist heartbeat and genuine reporting about women’s issues.
Should We Mourn the Death of Chick-Lit? (via The Guardian)
Point, Elizabeth Day: I don’t mourn the end of chick-lit, not because I don’t admire it when it’s done well but because the term has lost all meaning. It has become a catch-all label for a generic mass of pink-jacketed books with hand-illustrated covers depicting stilettos and Martini glasses.
Counterpoint, Tasmina Perry: I think it’s because we’re women. You don’t get David Nicholls isn’t name-checked in close proximity to the words chick-lit, even though One Day’s Emma Morley could hardly ever find a boyfriend. We write unapologetically commercial fiction with the aim of entertaining our readers, not winning Pulitzer prizes. And it’s not so much the publishers who are guilty of pigeonholing us (come on, one of Jodi’s books had toy soldiers on the front cover) but the public at large. After all, “chick-lit” trips off the tongue a lot more neatly than “women’s commercial fiction” when you’re describing what you read on your sun-lounger.
"Whether you’re a cupcake-baking porn lover, a Summer’s-Eve-hating urban farmer, a mom working a part-time job, or an avid activist waiting for the day that women can bring their girlfriends home without being shunned by family, we’re all fighting our own battles every day. And we’re fighting them for each other."
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91 years after women won the right to vote, Bust Magazine’s Erina Davidson writes on mutual respect for all types of women.
