2012 April Archive | Feministing

By Samhita • 11 years ago

What we missed

Stephen King says he’ll pay more in taxes and other rich people should too.

Dan Savage learned that fighting facts with fiction, or rather, highlighting Christian hypocrisy, makes you a bully.

In light of VAWA reauthorization–let’s not forget the role the economy has on domestic violence rates.

On the relationship of homophobia and being gay.

Those kids that walked out in protest of their school being shut down in Detroit turned around and started their own school. Because that’s how amazing young people are sometimes.

Stephen King says he’ll pay more in taxes and other rich people should too.

Dan Savage learned that fighting facts with fiction, or rather, highlighting Christian hypocrisy, makes you a bully.

In light of VAWA reauthorization–let’s ...

By Samhita • 11 years ago

Texas judge allows Planned Parenthood to be part of state Women’s Health Program

Good news from Texas–a judge in Texas has stopped the state from banning Planned Parenthood from participating in the state’s Women’s Health Program. This means Planned Parenthood will continue to receive much needed state funding to provide health care services to low income women in Texas. The bill was pushed by Republican legislators that were responding to constituents that were so opposed to having Planned Parenthood involved they were open to shutting down the entire Women’s Health Program. Wow, assholes!

via AP,

Judge Lee Yeakel ruled that there is sufficient evidence that the state law is unconstitutional. He imposed an injunction against enforcing it until he can hear full arguments.

The law passed last year by the Republican-controlled Legislature forbids state agencies from providing funds to ...

By Katie Halper • 11 years ago

Breaking: George Zimmerman has a new social media strategy!

When god closes a website, he opens a Facebook page! George Zimmerman’s defense attorney, Mark O’Mara, has established a Facebook and Twitter account for his client after Zimmerman disabled his previous website, which raised $200,000 for him. Zimmerman just plum forgot to disclose this money when the judge was determining his bond, something his lawyer deemed an “oversight.” You know when you forget about a couple hundred thousand dollars you have lying around? Of course you do – we’ve all been there. As of 2:11 PM on April 30th, the Facebook page already has 772 likes, and the twitter account has 625 followers and 41 tweets.

O’Mara explained the social media move:

First, we contend that social media in this day ...

By Samhita • 11 years ago

A New Day in Politics: Complicated conversations about Muslim women’s rights

I have been heartened by the substantive conversation happening in thought leadership publications about the plight of women in predominantly Arab and Muslim nations. Referring to Muslim women as people with desires, agency, needs and destinies is a new direction in how “the West” has ever talked about the real lives of women within these cultural contexts. But despite this continued desire to have these conversations–larger narratives about Muslim women and their bodies and Western intervention still dictate how these conversations play out.

Much of this was spurred by Mona Eltahawy’s controversial piece in Foreign Policy linked in yesterday’s Weekly Feminist Reader that came out last week called “Why do they hate us?” Her argument is pretty provocative calling out the ...

By Katie Halper • 11 years ago

Top 10 Best Political Jokes from the White House Correspondents Dinner

Saturday night’s White House Correspondents Dinner was chock-full-o corny jokes and problematic jokes (like “fat” jokes about Chris Christie– as if there aren’t substantive things to make fun of the Governor for). But there were some great moments that were both funny and meaningful from President Barack Obama and Jimmy Kimmel. Here’s a video compilation I made with a top 10 list below it. Warning: nothing will ever come close to Stephen Colbert’s brilliant, satirical, subversive and courageous roast of Bush back in 2006.

By Katie Halper • 11 years ago

Rachel Maddow and the truth versus condescending, sexist Republican consultant

Republican consultant Alex Castellanos is pretty good at his job. It’s not easy to fully represent the extent of the Republican Party’s sexism, and yet Castellanos manages to do so in both content and form! And that’s pretty impressive. He demonstrated his skills on Meet the Press, as he denied the well-documented phenomenon unequal pay. Castellanos must have unsubscribed from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research e-mail list, or he would have heard about their study showing that women make 77 cents cents per men’s dollar But, knowing it’s better to show than tell, Castellanos was in top sexist form, constantly interrupting Rachel Maddow, who was typically fact-based and gracious, and even saying, “I love how passionate you are. ...

By Maya Dusenbery • 11 years ago

Weekly Feminist Reader

The Oppressed Brown Girls Doing Things tumblr is the shit. [Via Racialicious]

Clutch remembers TLC’s Left-Eye a decade after her death.

The Marines are taking the first steps towards bringing women onto the front lines.

Laurie Penny on the sexual counter-revolution: “Female sexual autonomy itself is what’s really unorthodox today.”

Boehner, if you’re tired of people talking about the Republican “war on women,” maybe just stop supporting terrible policies?

Read Mona Eltahawy’s powerful piece on misogyny in the Middle East. Plus some critical responses.

At 87, Phyllis Schlafly is still fighting the bad fight.

Check out On The Issues‘ spring issue devoted to women in sports.

“Female friendship is one of nature’s preferred narrative tools”–

The Oppressed Brown Girls Doing Things tumblr is the shit. [Via Racialicious]

Clutch remembers TLC’s Left-Eye a decade after her death.

The Marines are taking the first steps towards bringing women onto the ...

By Anna • 11 years ago

The Feministing Five: dream hampton

dream hampton is a filmmaker, producer and writer whose voice has impacted cultural and political discourse for 20 years. hampton attended NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts both in the undergraduate and graduate film programs. It was there that hampton filmed her neighbor, Christopher “Notorious B.I.G.” Wallace, who was a friend and helped her complete a class project. This footage later became the Emmy-award winning VH1 documentary on the rapper titled, Behind the Music: Notorious B.I.G., of which she was an Associate Producer. She also co-produced the first feature length film about the rapper titled, “Bigger Than Life.” In 2002, her narrative short film “I AM ALI” was an entry at Sundance Film Festivals and won “Best Short ...