Tag Archive for "Deep Thoughts"

Posts Tagged Deep Thoughts

Against Visibility

When Jared Leto won a Golden Globe and then an Oscar for playing a (caricature of a) transgender woman in Dallas Buyers Club, I witnessed so much cis mansplaining about how Leto’s performance and award show appearances were good for trans women, because we needed visibility. Lots of folks don’t know about trans people, they argued, and Leto was educating them – plus his performance wasn’t that bad, it was accurate to how trans women were (seen by these cis men) at that time. When Laverne Cox made the cover of TIME, Andrew Sullivan responded by arguing that trans people should be willing to talk about our genitals when asked because people ...

When Jared Leto won a Golden Globe and then an Oscar for playing a (caricature of a) transgender woman in Dallas Buyers Club, I witnessed so much cis mansplaining about how Leto’s performance ...

By Juliana Britto Schwartz • 11 years ago

Little Miss Hispanic Delaware pageant: all contestants must show us their papers to prove they’re Latina

Image Credit: Colorlines

Late last month, the news came out that the Nuestras Raices Little Miss Hispanic Delaware beauty pageant was dethroning its latest winner, Jakiyah McCoy, after she was unable to provide documentation of her “Hispanic heritage.” McCoy is black, and it appears that she was the only contestant required to prove her ethnicity, suggesting that Latin@s cannot look black.

Since then, the pageant has released a letter trying to clear up the mess.

Image Credit: Colorlines

Late last month, the news came out that the Nuestras Raices Little Miss Hispanic Delaware beauty pageant was dethroning its latest winner, Jakiyah McCoy, after ...

By Jos Truitt • 11 years ago

On trans issues within feminism and strengthening the movement’s gender analysis

I’ve taken some time away from blogging while I’ve been in grad school, and it’s given me an opportunity for some perspective on the feminist blogosphere. I started working at Feministing in 2009 with a goal of centering trans issues within feminism. I think the oppression trans folks face, particularly the extreme marginalization and violence aimed at trans women in this misogynist culture, is exactly what feminism can exist to change. I understand feminism as a response to gendered oppression in a patriarchal context, where femininity is devalued. I see the worst of our gender hierarchy landing on the shoulders of folks who fail to meet the strict rules of the compulsory gender binary in a way that’s perceived as feminine. This ...

By Sesali B. • 11 years ago

“Hookup Culture” does not exist

When I first heard about the Air Force’s top commander, Gen. Mark A. Welsh III, dismissing cases of sexual assault in the military as a result of “hookup mentality”, I was obviously upset for many of the same reasons that Katie expressed yesterday. Why are we associating consensual sex with rape? But I was also upset that the term “hookup culture” was being used in the first place as a serious thing.

Sex is sex. Not only that, people have been engaging in sexual activity — spontaneously, pre-maritally, extra-maritally, unmarried, with the opposite sex, with the same sex, but most important, consensually — way before us under 30 people were even born. Assuming that today’s youth are more engaged in ...

By Chloe Angyal • 12 years ago

Growing up, growing old, and getting pierced

When I was fifteen, I got my belly button pierced.

At the time, I really wanted to be a dancer. I was dancing four or five days a week, at an open studio where there were often professional dancers in my classes. When I looked around the room at the best dancers, the ones who I knew were doing commercial work, they all had one thing in common: they had navel piercings.

So I begged my parents to let me do it too. I whinged, and wheedled, and cajoled, and complained. I tried the door-in-the-face technique, saying that I wanted to get a tattoo, so that a mere navel piercing would seem reasonable by comparison.

Eventually, some time around October, they yielded ...

When I was fifteen, I got my belly button pierced.

At the time, I really wanted to be a dancer. I was dancing four or five days a week, at an open studio where there were often ...

By Chloe Angyal • 12 years ago

There is no right way to hate your body

This weekend, I had the great honour of speaking on a panel with the incredible Hanne Blank and the estimable Therese Shechter.

We were there – at Momentum – to talk about sex and body image online, and our panel was what Hanne called a confetti conversation: we threw a bunch of bright and diverse but related ideas up in the air and watched them float around the room.

Therese spoke about how online spaces are often the only place where you can find fat bodies being publicly sexual in a way that is depicted as good and desirable and sexy. I spoke about the privilege that I enjoy when I write about body image, and how I ...

This weekend, I had the great honour of speaking on a panel with the incredible Hanne Blank and the estimable Therese Shechter.

We were there – at Momentum – to talk about sex and body ...

By Jos Truitt • 12 years ago

The ways of talking about the “war on women” that leave people out

There’s been a lot of talk lately on the feminist internets – everywhere, really – about the Republican “war on women.” The bevy of anti-choice legislation is absolutely that – Republicans intend to go after women. But I’m finding much of the feminist response hurtful in its conflation of “women” and “people who can make babies.”

There are plenty of women who don’t have what you call a uterus or vagina (though they might use those terms). There are plenty of women who can’t get pregnant or deliver a baby, for tons of reasons. Including cisgender women, intersex women, and transgender women. Being able to make a baby and being a woman are not the same thing.

There are also plenty of ...

By Jessica • 13 years ago

On Being a Chef, a Woman, and the Need for Safe Spaces

Every once in a while I come across an article on the internet about female chefs. A quick Google search for ‘female chef’ pulls up sparse results, usually a year or more between each entry. If you search ‘female pastry chef’ (more relevant to me because I AM one), you find still less. The articles that DO come up are very often written about a chef or chefs, but not by the chef.

Some background on me: I am a pastry chef – currently the assistant to the head pastry chef of where I work, and that’s not a bad place to be. I have also worked on occasion as a line cook, a prep cook, and off and on ...