Posts tagged: feminism
Had to listen to the whole poem from the photo set going around tumblr. She’s fucking brilliant. Will start following her for sure.
Transcript :
“We’ve learned to call queens outside of their real titles. Girls became ‘Jawns’, ‘Jawns’ became ‘bitches’, and bitches ain’t shit but hoes and tricks. Whose trick was that? Is it a coincidence that the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene share the same name, but not the same crown? These girls have no crown. Just scalp-pats and ass-taps. They say “Hit it from the back”. Well, I couldn’t look a Queen in the eye either. So we’ll just pretend they’re all animals or objects. Because devotion is harder than disconnection. Someone disconnect the throne from the seat of their elastic denim. Beat them till they bounce back like rubber-banded bimbos. Tell them bend over. Can you wave hello to hell? Can you smell the burning embers? Does it smell like sulphur? Does it smell like dirty twat? You know, dirty twats get swatted into filthy gutters. We’ve got to get our minds out the gutter. Gotta get these hoes off the track. Gotta get this glue out this trap. Those sticky, Nicki Minaj impersonators, those self-proclaimed “Bad bitches”, “Hood Bitches”, “Five-star Bitches”. They disrespect the galaxies because heaven has no place for whores. So where will they go? Sexual freedom isn’t acceptable for women. Due to the misogyny massaged into men’s brains. A Queen loses her crown when she loses her virginity. And a Queen becomes a ‘bitch’ when she likes it.”
— Kai Davis, A Queen Loses Her Crown When She Loses Her Virginity
Sonya Renee Taylor, “What Women Deserve”
Culturally-diversified biracial girl with
a small diamond nose ring and a pretty smile
poses besides the words
“Women Deserve Better”.
and I almost let her non-threatening grin
begin to infiltrate my psyche
until I read the unlikely small print
at the bottom of the ad:
Sponsored by the US Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities
and the Knights of Columbus
On a bus
in a city
with a population of 563,000,
4 teenage mothers on the bus with me,
1 Latina woman with 3 children under 3
and no signs of a daddy.
One sixteen year old black girl
standing in 22-degree weather
with only a sweater
a book bag
and a bassinette,
with an infant that ain’t even four weeks yet
tell me that Yes ….
Women do deserve better.
Women deserve better
than public transportation rhetoric
from the same people who
won’t give that teenage mother
a ride to the next transit.
Won’t let you talk to their kids about safer sex
Have never had to listen as the door SLAMS
behind the man who adamantly says,
“That shit” ain’t his
leaving her to wonder how she’ll raise this kid.
Women deserve better
than the 300 dollars TANF and AFC
will provide that family of three
or the 6 dollar an hour job at KFC
with no benefits for her new baby
or the college degree she may never see
because you can’t have infants at the university
Women deserve better
than lip service paid for by politicians
who have no alternatives to abortion
though I am sure
right this moment one of their seventeen year old daughters
is sitting in a clinic lobby
sobbing quietly and anonymously
praying parents don’t find out
or will be waiting for mom to pick her up because research shows
that out-of-wedlock childbirth doesn’t look good on political polls and
Daddy ain’t having that.
Women deserve better
than backwards governmental policies
that don’t want to pay
for welfare for kids
or health care for kids
or child care for kids
Don’t want to pay living wages to working mothers,
Don’t want to make men who only want to be last night’s lovers
responsible for the semen they lay.
Flat out don’t want to pay for SHIT
but want to control the woman who’s having it.
Acting outraged at abortion.
Well I’m outraged
that they want us to believe
that they believe
that women deserve better.
The Vatican won’t prosecute pedophile priests
But I decide I’m not ready for motherhood
and it’s condemnation for me
These are the same people who won’t support
national condom distribution to prevent teenage pregnancy.
But women deserve better.
Women deserve better
than back-alley surgeries
that leave our wombs barren and empty.
Deserve better
than organizations bearing the name
of land-stealing racist rapists
funding million dollar campaigns on subway trains
with no money to give these women
while balding middle-aged white men
tell us what to do with our bodies
while they wage wars and kill other people’s babies
So maybe women deserve better
than propaganda and lies
to get into panties
Propaganda and lies
to get into office
to get out of court
to get out of paying child support
Get the fuck out of our decisions
and give us back our voice
Women do deserve better
Women deserve choice
Feminist Frequency on race and casting for The Hunger Games
where race and gender intersect
David Graeber, “Beyond Power/Knowledge: An Exploration of Power, Ignorance and Stupidity” (pdf)
He also says much the same thing in “Revolutions in Reverse,” an essay included in the book Revolutions in Reverse (which can be read in Scribd at the link). I’d been meaning to post a quote from the second source for a while, thanks to Aaron Brady for the actual excerpt above. That last link is a good essay on the recent Rush Limbaugh BS and how patriarchy works and how male privilege is defended by having men like Limbaugh around to keep women’s opinions out of the allowed discourse on the subject. To keep high school boys forever unable to write essays that could relate to the issue of needing hormonal birth control to control ovarian cysts.
(via youthisastateofmind)
We talked about this a lot this year in English. Girls are taught from a young age that we have to connect to what we read, so when we do excercises in class, everyone talks about how they connect to Huck Finn, or to Jay Gatsby, or to Julius Caesar. We connect to all the characters because we have to, because if we don’t then we won’t survive through the years of school.
Boys don’t deal with this. Practically every book or story they encounter from the time they begin school is full of male characters and written by men. So when confronted with female characters of female authors, they don’t know what to do. They feel as if they can’t connect with these characters because of the gender boundaries. As one woman in my class pointed out, “girls have to connect to male characters, but boys don’t have to connect to female characters.” By the time they’re my age, it’s not even intentional: many honestly think that they won’t understand a female character because they have no shared experiences whatsoever.
(via animehrmine)
