24 May 2013
Kristen E. Nelson is the author of Write, Dad (Unthinkable Creatures Press, 2012). She has recently published work in The Volta, Denver Quarterly Drunken Boat, Tarpaulin Sky Journal, Trickhouse, and Everyday Genius, among others. She is a founder and the Executive Director of Casa Libre en la Solana, a non-profit writing center in Tucson, Arizona; a production editor for Tarpaulin [...]
22 May 2013
By Elizabeth Dorssom I first started referring to myself as a feminist when I was 17. Even though I didn’t identify as a feminist until I was older I was definitely a feminist from a very young age. When I was in elementary school I enjoyed playing with Hot Wheels cars instead [...]
20 May 2013
By Molly Baker On April 23, University of Arizona student Dean Saxton, better known as Brother Dean, stood on a bench brandishing a sign that bluntly stated in bold, black letters “You Deserve Rape.” Saxton proceeded to verbally harass many women that walked by on their way to class, calling them [...]
15 May 2013
By Mohadesa Najumi When I think about what modesty means in today’s political, cultural and religious environment, I am inclined to believe that the concept itself does not involve choice, or any dimension of freedom or independent thought. Rather, modesty constitutes a dictatorial concept forced upon women whether they agree [...]
7 May 2013
*Trigger warning* Sometimes I feel like the NRA is actively just trying to lose all the credibility it has left in this world. Just when you thought the NRA’s annual convention in Houston this weekend couldn’t draw any more negative attention, it goes out and casually promotes a company selling a product [...]
29 Mar 2013
By Monica Torres When I sign my name, it’s Monica, not Mónica. When I order pupusas at my favorite restaurant, the waiter will give my accent an approving nod, as if to say, you’re one of us. But it will only take a harder question for me to reveal the [...]
18 Mar 2013
By Alexa Lambertis At an early age, I was exposed to a woman who essentially changed my life. A sweet lady with a southern background, she was introduced to me as a family friend. I met her in her own home, where we would spend a majority of our time [...]
By Josh Cerretti and Theresa Warburton What does it mean for a white person living in a white supremacist society to label themselves an ‘anti-racist feminist’? Does it surrender control over the meaning of the term ‘feminist’ (unmodified) to those who tacitly support white supremacy? Does it again re-center the good intentions of white people and their need to be validated by the people of color in whose oppression...
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By Grace Ji-Sun Kim Race Relations “It’s so nice and warm on the inside that you forget that there’s an outside. The worst of it is, the crab that mostly keeps you down is you…The realization had her mind on fire.” —Terry Pratchett, Unseen Academicals I was heading home from speaking at the Presbyterian Church in Canada, Synod of British Columbia meeting when a short incident on the plane...
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By Lynn Gehl − Gii-Zhigaate-Mnidoo-Kwe Recently I stated that unless “we” stand behind the person who is most oppressed, “we” will not gain the genuine solidarity needed. This is because the more oppressed person needs to know that when the more privileged person gets what s/he needs, that s/he will continue to stand behind their needs rather than drop them. The person who is most oppressed needs to understand...
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By Stacia Penn I am a young black American living in Colombia. My life in Medellin has been a multi-faceted privilege, affording me access to spaces and ways of knowing that I would otherwise not have access to in the United States. In one sense, it has been a privilege to live abroad and explore and experiment as an artist, a subject different from the Bachelor’s degree I received...
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By Duchess Harris In Lonnae O’Neal Parker’s January 18 Washington Post article “Four Years Later, Feminists Split by Michelle Obama’s ‘Work’ as First Lady,” she includes a provocative quote from Leslie Morgan Steiner, author of Mommy Wars: Stay-at-Home and Career Moms Face Off on TheirChoices, Their Lives, Their Families (2007). Steiner asks, “Are fashion and body-toning tips all we can expect from one of the most highly educated First Ladies in history?” Steiner...
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By Farah Tanis, Kalima DeSuze, and Nikki Patin Black Women’s Blueprint It is over 180 years since the abolition movement, 165 years since women’s suffrage, and approximately 50 years since the women’s liberation movement propelled American feminism to center stage. Despite noticeable progress, numerous literary and cultural productions, media recognition from the mainstream to the pseudo underground, and other incredible efforts have barely chipped away at the fundamental conflicts...
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By Aishah Shahidah Simmons and Heather Laine Talley Perhaps in this twenty-four hour news cycle culture, the horrid sexist and racist sexualization of nine-year old Quvenzhané Wallis both at the Academy Awards and in Twittersphere is now old news. And maybe for her sake, it should be. White feminists’ silence in the face of racism is old news too, but feminism’s troubled relationship with race and racism is something...
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Mr. Prime Minister: I read today that you were “disturbed” about the rape of another child in Delhi, a five-year-old girl. My question to you is: just how “disturbed” are you? What does the rape of a five-year-old female child make you feel? Do you sit in your plush office and shake your head in disbelief? Do you sit in your secure mansion at Raisina Hill eating your good...
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By Nicole Verdes Last week, Isabella Dutton, a 57-year-old mother of two in the United Kingdom, wrote a first-person story for the Daily Mail wherein she described her two children as her “biggest regret.” Her admission set off a firestorm of backlash from irate readers. Dutton herself predicted the looming backlash in her article by pointing out, “It’s just that I have been honest. In doing so I have broken...
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A few days before my Facebook News Feed was flooded with red equal signs, I went to a short march in Bangalore. The Gender and Sexual Minorities Pride March demanded, among other things, “human rights and overall development” of a range of sexual minorities, focusing on the right to be included on the electoral rolls, access to social services for those below the poverty line, job skills support, low-cost...
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By j.n. salters I was compelled to complain because I feel that the vast majority of black folks who are subjected daily to forms of racial harassment have accepted this as one of the social conditions of our life in white supremacist patriarchy that we cannot change. This acceptance is a form of complicity…. Racial hatred is real. And it is humanizing to be able to resist it with militant...
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By Ren Jender “She must have been miserable,” one of my Facebook “friends” wrote as a kind of eulogy for Margaret Thatcher. I had to disagree. Margaret Thatcher, before she began to suffer from dementia, had, in every recorded moment of her political career (as well as her writing after that career was over) the same joy as Pat Buchanan has in his television appearances: the both of them...
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Last week, while grieving parents of the children killed in Newtown were tearfully urging gun control measures, Rep. Steve Stockman (R-Tex.) boldly launched—to well deserved criticism—a new “pro-life” campaign slogan: “If babies had guns they wouldn’t be aborted.” The slogan, printed on a campaign bumper sticker, is a ridiculous statement from a politician known for reactionary and controversial Tweets that reveal, among other attributes, a lack of critical thinking...
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22 May 2013
By Aditi Rao Dear Mr. Yadav, I too am an Indian Woman “Referring to the recent ‘Slut Walk’ held in the Capital, Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav said we had naked women walking down the streets with tattoos on their cheeks, whereas Indian women did not even look up while [...]
17 May 2013
Assata do not dry like dissipated plums under castro’s bronzing sun you mural fortress you live memorial spirited artifice rouged sea salt that marinates america’s wound Assata you like stripped bone road unaware of which exit is free birth brown coagulated rhythm redefined reborn rumba queen Assata dusk breath [...]
16 May 2013
“Affirmation” by Assata Shakur* ___ I believe in living. I believe in the spectrum of Beta days and Gamma people. I believe in sunshine. In windmills and waterfalls, tricycles and rocking chairs. And i believe that seeds grow into sprouts. And sprouts grow into trees. I believe in the magic [...]
7 May 2013
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