You're no different than I am

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/22/ellen-challenges-john-mcc_n_103016.html

I'm not really that interested in American politics at all, and I'm only vaguely familiar with this guy, but he seems like an idiot. Ellen Degeneres is amazing though.

For the link-phobic, it's Ellen questioning John McCain on her upcoming marriage to her long-term partner, whose name escapes me right now. Gay marriage is a big issue in the US I gather.

It bugs me though. He says:

"And I know that we have a respectful disagreement on that issue."

There is nothing, nothing respectful about obstructing someone's rights like that, saying that their love is just not good enough for the state. Fuck off.

I love how Ellen makes it clear that everyone is the same; she gives excellent, eloquent arguments and McCain can't seem to find a word to say in response. But then, bigots aren't known for their ability to actually justify what they're saying.

MPs back 24-week abortion limit

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7409696.stm

THANK YOU BRITAIN. I'm proud of us right now. Well done.

Of course, the abortion law in this country is still a bit archaic (two doctors? Really?) and if it were up to me people would get their filthy little noses out of an individual woman's bodily business, but whatever. It's a start.

There are some absolutely hilarious quotes though on the article. I'd advise reading through it.

Sexual Harassment Is Rubbish

My little sister is 19. She is beautiful and fashionable and friendly. She loves office work and finished a course in it quite recently, picking up an apprenticeship in a local office straight after.

She now has to leave that job. Why? Because she's being harassed by her boss.

I've been trying to make her notice that her boss buying her knickers for her birthday and sending texts saying "I love you" is highly inappropriate, but she's been saying it's just because he's nice. I don't know what's finally flipped the switch, but he's crossed a line somewhere and she's leaving as soon as she can.

Now that he knows she isn't going to pull down her skinny jeans for him, he has completely changed. She should be doing administrative stuff; instead, he has her cleaning the office. He deliberately messes it up again straight after so she has to keep doing it. That's just a textbook case of a slighted man trying to assert his masculinity and put the uppity woman back in her place, isn't it? It makes me SO ANGRY.

Luckily, she's reporting it, not that it'll go anywhere because no one cares. She brought it on herself, they'll say. She gave him the wrong idea. Or he'll say she's lying (though I hope she's kept the texts, in that case). Whatever. If I could, I would be performing some violence in his direction right now. HE should be the one leaving, the one forced to go elsewhere. Not her.

And my family wonder why I'm a feminist...

Disturbing Reading

If you want some deeply emotional reading based on a true story, this graphic novel (available to read online) is the way to go. It's the disturbing story of a girl in Cambodia who unwittingly becomes a man's mistress and suffers the consequences. Very touching.

Honour her body by killing her

The 'honour' killing of Rand Abdel-Qader a short while ago makes me doubt humanity as a whole, it really does. I mean, it's bad enough that a 17-year-old girl was violently murdered by her father for some fleeting conversations with a British soldier, but for the father to then stand up and be proud of what he did is disgusting. The poor girl's mother attempted to help her, but the girl's two brothers just assisted their father in the murder.

(As a side note, to avoid ambiguity, when I talk about men here I'm meaning those who would behave like this or condone such behaviour, not men in general.)

The disrespect shown to this young woman is appalling. How dare she have a teenage crush? How dare she act like any ordinary young person? How dare she disobey the terrifyingly strong patriarchy of her culture?

Abdel-Qader, 46, a government employee, was initially arrested but released after two hours. Astonishingly, he said, police congratulated him on what he had done. 'They are men and know what honour is,' he said.

Perhaps what the bastard is trying to say here is that honour is pulling apart your daughter's life and throwing it unceremoniously into a grave because you're slightly embarrassed that she was doing something against the rules you put in place. Perhaps honour is just a word, to them, for keeping in line with the harsh system they've built up around them. I suppose they've got to be pretty careful because once women realise how powerful we are, there's no stopping us.

What really got to me, though, was this quote from the father:

People from western countries might be shocked, but our girls are not like their daughters that can sleep with any man they want and sometimes even get pregnant without marrying. Our girls should respect their religion, their family and their bodies.

For a start, 'your' girls are their own person, and us Westerners are our own people too. Quit with the possessive language; it's disturbing and weak. Moreover, though, how can this utter idiot say that a woman should value her family and body when he's just stomped a member of his family to death? How is that respecting her body? What has her body got to do with talking to a British soldier? (Another side note; I bet that soldier is utterly disturbed by this).

One last snippet that made my stomach turn:

Speaking with a foreign solider, she lost what is the most precious thing for any woman.

Yes. Her life.

The Ova Vs. The Sperm

My entire life, I've had this image of the placid little egg laying in wait in the uterus for the mighty sperm to fight their valiant way to find it. I've imagined the little sperm shoving itself into the egg triumphantly, a sign of its strength. I know I have this image because that's what's been fed to me all through school and all through anything I've read about it until now.

Because apparently, it really doesn't happen like that.

The sperm is a weak swimmer and the egg actively draws the sperm closer. The ova is certainly not passive; the link above suggest eagerness if anything. How was I so completely unaware of this?

Yet another example of man's inability to see the world how it really is while they're wrapped up in their bigoted little life. And yes, I know I'm generalising, and no, I don't care right now.

Nothingness Is Better Than Femininity

There is an absolutely fascinating article over at The F-World, one of my favourite feminist websites (mostly because it's UK-focused and therefore more relevant to me). It is an article on that overused issue of fatness, but it made me think, and I like thinking.

I suppose my favourite point, one I had never really thought about, is this:

Each successive feminist wave was followed by a powerful and destructive backlash that put women in ever tighter situations. First we were trapped in society at large, then in our homes and now we are trapped in our bodies. Our focus has become more intense. It now rests sharply on us, on ourselves and on our faults.

That is absolutely true and a wonderful point.

The article also points out that women are supposed to be fatter than men due to the greater number of functions our body does that needs a balance of fat. Therefore, excess fat can be linked to femininity (let's not forget that's basically what breasts are), and the purging of this in eating disorders is purging a big part of womanhood. I'm not saying you have to be fat - or curvy at all - to be a woman, because of course that's ridiculous, but most women have curves and all women are encouraged to lose them.

Maybe by ridding ourselves of fat, we are becoming more like men and therefore more in control. We lose our feminine shapes, our breasts, even our period! I'm lucky enough to never have suffered from a major eating disorder (beyond the teenage freak-out hating of my suddenly curvy body that lead me to wear badly fitting bras for years in denial of my 32FF bra size) but I've seen it in practically every other female in my family. Perhaps eating disorders, as a part of the backlash against feminism, are practically encouraged just as a distraction and a fake way for women to become 'empowered' (I hate that word). I have noticed in the past that a lot of people perceive feminism almost as a denial of femininity; this is a false view, of course, but maybe it makes women feel better to be shapeless and indistinguishable from the background. Nothingness is better than femininity.

I don't think it's much of a coincidence, after all, that I've only started to accept my shape around the same time I've become increasingly interested in feminism.