femme feminist

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) specifically allows anyone over the age of 17 to purchase emergency contraception regardless of gender, but Walgreens stores in Texas and Mississippi seem to be having trouble enacting that policy. On at least two separate occasions earlier this year, the company denied access to the “morning-after pill” to men who were not accompanied by their female partners...

i really do not understand the logic of electing someone who wants to secede from the US…

A former head of the Sons of the Confederate Veterans post in Hot Springs, Mauch calls the Confederate flag “a symbol of Jesus Christ,” and is a current member of The League of the South, a group which works toward the formation of an independent Southern nation.

Founded in 1994 in Killen, Ala., The League of the South advocates for “the secession and subsequent independence of the southern states from this forced union and the formation of a southern republic,” according to the “Introduction” page on its website. The site also encourages members to “personally secede from the corrupt and corrupting influence of post-Christian culture in America” by home-schooling children and creating “parallel institutions to which people can attach their loyalties.”

i generally enjoy gawker, but i have to say that when i saw the headline: “Barak Obama’s Indonesian Tranny Nanny” i was highly offended. yes, yes you’re witty, you can rhyme while using a demeaning slur! what’s even more disheartening is that gawker has not responded to comments pointing out that “tranny” is offensive, inappropriate, and a slur. of course the responses of other gawker commenters is all in the attitude of “oh shut up you stupid politically correct liberals. why do you have to ruin it for everyone? it’s FUNNY.”

i’m sure that gawker would never use the “N word” in a story, and i’d venture a guess that they’re probably not going to use the word “fag”, yet they throw around “tranny” as though it is not a derogatory term. an attitude of nonchalance regarding verbal harassment of trans people is simply not acceptable although it is common-place even within the lgbtq community. labels like “tranny” allow us to designate someone different as “other” and if we do not see them as a person it is very easy to not only verbally attack them but to physically attack them as well.

interestingly enough, gawker’s “sister site” jezebel has an article from june of this year that includes a discussion on the word “tranny”:

Kaveney writes… prejudice “starts with name-calling, but it doesn’t always end there.” Violence begins with words, starting with hate-speech and slurs. Furthermore, the words we use are always important, even within a community.

Please take a moment to let gawker know that using the word “tranny” is not funny, it is insensitive to a marginalized group of individuals who experience discrimination and violence on a daily basis. 90% of transgender youth reported feeling unsafe at school because of their gender expression; and 55% have experienced physical violence according to GLSEN. acceptance of hate speech and slurs does nothing but make it even that much harder for trans individuals and youth.

You can email gawker’s editor in chief Remy Stern <remy@gawker.com> and contact him via twitter @remystern please take a moment to speak out and let gawker know that using words like “tranny” is not ok!

this is disgusting.

Three St. Charles North High School students who wore T-shirts with the words “Straight Pride” and a Bible quote that references putting gay people to death will not face disciplinary action, school district officials said Tuesday.

The students told school administrators that the T-shirts were not meant to indicate a desire to cause harm, but to convey pride in being straight, according to students.

The three male students wore the T-shirts on Monday. They reportedly included a quote from Leviticus 20:13 which states, “If a man lay with a male as those who lay with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination and shall surely be put to death.”

[…]

The Defense of Marriage Act is due for a two-pronged attack on Tuesday, as two separate organizations and sets of lawyers, representing different plaintiffs, plan to file lawsuits in federal court challenging the federal definition of marriage…

i had not heard about this before but it’s really disgusting that it made it through the really difficult process of becoming an iphone app! great commentary on this blog:

Gender in this case was used as a weapon and this app specifically implied that trans people are falsifying who they are thus making it appropriate to mock them for the sake of entertainment. The genesis of this idea is cissupremacy.  Lisa Harney, defines cissexism as “the assumption that your sex, your gender are superior and more valid than trans people’s sex and gender.” Inserting a cisgender woman into the average picture would not give rise to amusement or give cause for derision because cis bodies are not only normalized, they are expected and respected. Gender is only considered comical when it involves trans people because their identities are not considered real rather trans identities are seen as an artificial and self constructed.

sadly, i have seen this first-hand. when it comes to activism the solution to a problem is never to “make the website look better” unless the problem is the website looks crappy.

Digital activists hide behind gloried stories of viral campaigns and inflated figures of how many millions signed their petition in 24 hours. Masters of branding, their beautiful websites paint a dazzling self-portrait. But, it is largely a marketing deception. While these organisations are staffed by well-meaning individuals who sincerely believe they are doing good, a bit of self-criticism is sorely needed from their leaders.

The truth is that as the novelty of online activism wears off, millions of formerly socially engaged individuals who trusted digital organisations are coming away believing in the impotence of all forms of activism. Even leading Bay Area clicktivist organisations are finding it increasingly difficult to motivate their members to any action whatsoever. The insider truth is that the vast majority, between 80% to 90%, of so-called members rarely even open campaign emails. Clicktivists are to blame for alienating a generation of would-be activists with their ineffectual campaigns that resemble marketing.

Via Deirdra Harris Glover