a-game-of-romance-and-winchester:
So let me tell you about the shittiest parent on the motherfucking planet.
I work at a grocery store and this man comes in with his 11 year old son. He buys a pack a cigarettes and a two cases of beer. The son was holding a two dollar drawing pad and placed it on the belt and I guess the dad didn’t notice it at first but when I was about to scan the pad he asked where’d it have come from and turned towards the kid and asked “Did you put that shit up there?”. He told me to put it back and then told his 11 year old child that he “ain’t paying for that gay ass notebook.”. So I looked at the kid, who was close to tears and saying how he ran out of paper at home and my heart broke. So I gave the pad to him, for free, and told the dad I would take care of it. I gave the kid some tokens for a game outside and said I would look forward to buying some of his drawings and paintings when he’s all famous. He kids face was so priceless and I thought everything was good. But then, about 10 ten minutes after giving the kid his notebook, I walked outside and saw this. The drawing pad all ripped up and tossed on the pavement. I could only imagine what happened in the parking lot, but I know that that poor kid heart is fucking ripped apart, just like this pad.
I’m fucking horrified that there are parents like this, who, just because it’s not masculine or gender specificthey won’t let their children follow their true passions or explore interests that lead to their happiness. Even more so, I’m horrified that parents don’t care about the fine arts anymore because it doesn’t have job security. Since when did it ever matter to a child if their passion makes them money or not? Parenting is about supporting whatever makes your child happy. Have some fucking consideration for your child’s wants not your homophobic and anti-art ideals.
I despise that poor excuse for a father and want to kick him off a bridge.
Hi, I just wanted to share something positive that also sheds more light into how girls are treated when it comes to toys and growing up. This is a video for a toy called GoldieBlox and I think it’s brilliant.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-AtZfNU3zw&feature=player_embedded
I think this is totally brilliant!
It uses a strength typically considered feminine - language understanding - to open up the world of engineering - typically considered a masculine strength.
It encourages girls in problem solving and building and spacial thinking and such without removing femininity, so it’s not like a girl playing this game would be called a tomboy or something for playing.
And best of all, it’s not just some toy for boys that’s been watered down and blasted in pink to appeal to a market of young girls. It’s a toy made for girls, that appeals to girls, that teaches girls things that I never learned because such toys did not exist, and boys would not let me play with their toys.
I want to play this game for myself. :)
Gwen Sharp in Policing Mascuility in Slim Jim’s “Spice Loss” Ads (via biraciallyinsensitive)
Boom.
(via mehreenkasana)
(Source: queerblackandproud)
The many faces of Charlotte La Bouff.
#I think one of my favortie things about charlotte la bouff is the fact she has this fantastically broad array of facial expressions #so often you see females being portrayed with such a limited range #basic happy basic sad basic laughing basic surprise #in order to maintain this natural cool prettiness that women are supposed to have #and charlottes gorgeous but shes also whacky and incredibly animated #shes jam packed with personality and a great supporting character #i typoed favorite in the first tag and dont careyes, this, good
Lottie is the best
Plus she’s one of the few rich characters I’ve seen who isn’t the villain. She’s spoiled but isn’t spoiled rotten. She’s demanding, superficial, and a bit of the dramatic side, but she’s genuinely a good person who doesn’t give a single fuck that her best friend is a black waitress. Oh, and when she realizes said best friend is in love with the prince she’s been chasing after the entire movie? She doesn’t get angry or petty or jealous. Lottie is genuinely happy for Tiana and does her damnedest to help her and Naveen get their happily ever after, the celebrates the fuck out of Tiana finally reaching her dreams. How often do we get to see a spoiled yet utterly caring girl portrayed on screen? A 1920s Southern debutante with more depth to her character than her appearance? A woman who can be feminine and rich but still bold, brave, hilariously quirky, and ACTUALLY GIVES MORE OF A SHIT ABOUT HER BEST FRIEND THAN THE DAMN PRINCE? A PRINCE SHE THINKS SHE’S BEEN DATING and then it turns out it was all fake scam to get her dad’s money. Does Lottie sit down and weep about it? Plot a scheme to steal him away from her best friend? Nope, just gonna kiss that gross frog and risk warty lips/frog herpes/dude she’s kissing an amphibian all because she loves and cares about Tiana.
ALL IN A CHILDREN’S FILM.
Lottie is one of my favorite Disney girls for always and forever
Somewhere between really feminine and really masculine lies me.
Cut the phrase “real woman” from your vocabulary. You know what a real woman is? Anyone who identifies as a woman. I am not any less of a woman because of the shape of my body. I am not any less of a woman because I don’t have curves.
Am I more of a woman when I give myself feminine features on photoshop? Do I meet your standards now?
Am I less of a feminist because I shave? Or like makeup? Or like baking?
Body positive means all sizes. Feminism means respecting my choices too.
Ana Mendieta
Untitled (Facial Hair Transplants), 1972
In these performative self-portraits taken in the final stages of her master’s degree (in painting, but that’s a different story) at the University of Iowa, Cuban-born artist Ana Mendieta carefully transfers the facial hair of her bearded, male friend Morty Sklar to her own face, gluing it to her chin/jaws as Sklar cuts it from his. She starts off with a soft, hairless face next to Sklar’s full beard, and ends up with a full beard herself (but sadly no mustache). She would later use the second-to-last photo (the frontal solo portrait) as the basis for a series of silk screens which ended up being her final thesis submission (well, hence painting), but the performance and resulting photos themselves are much more interesting than that.In the performance, Mendieta actively reverses the act of depilation that is a frequent ritual for so many (invisible) women with facial hair, and instead deliberately grows a beard in a matter of minutes. By doing so, she shows the strong gender-specificity (or exclusivity) of this symbol of identification called facial hair. While Sklar with-beard might be seen as somewhat unkempt by the average viewer (something easily fixed with a little trimming), his beardedness would raise no other questions; most would glance over him or be more inclined to notice some other aspect of his appearance, if any. Mendieta with-beard, however, is virtually incomprehensible to the conventional gaze. Magically, the exact same stuff, on a different face, suddenly has a wildly different meaning. -J
(via unacceptablebeards)
This is powerful in some way that I can’t quite explain. It’s eye opening, only very slightly unsettling, and completely intriguing. I love it.
Being Nice (via sashanako)
men are always telling me to “take things less serious.” I feel like if I was a man this would never happen. I’m attracted to strong men, but only the ones who realize my strength makes me no less of a woman.
(via peacehon)
When I do book signings, most of my line is made up of young girls with their mothers, teen girls alone, and mother friend groups. But there’s usually at least one boy with a stack of my books. This boy is anywhere from 8-19, he’s carrying a worn stack of the Books of Bayern, and he’s excited and unashamed to be a fan of those books. As I talk to him, 95% of the time I learn this fact: he is home schooled.
There’s something that happens to our boys in school. Maybe it’s because they’re around so many other boys, and the pressure to be a boy is high. They’re looking around at each other, trying to figure out what it means to be a boy—and often their conclusion is to be “not a girl.” Whatever a girl is, they must be the opposite. So a book written by a girl? With a girl on the cover? Not something a boy should be caught reading.
But something else happens in school too. Without even meaning to perhaps, the adults in the boy’s life are nudging the boy away from “girl” books to “boy” books. When I go on tour and do school visits, sometimes the school will take the girls out of class for my assembly and not invite the boys. I talk about reading and how to fall in love with reading. I talk about storytelling and how to start your own story. I talk about things that aren’t gender-exclusive. But because I’m a girl and there are girls on my covers, often I’m deemed a girl-only author. I wonder, when a boy author goes to those schools with their books with boys on the covers, are the girls left behind? I want to question this practice. Even if no boy ever really would like one of my books, by not inviting them, we’re reinforcing the wrong and often-damaging notion that there’s girls-only stuff and you aren’t allowed to like it.
I hear from teachers that when they read Princess Academy in class (by far the most girlie-sounding of all my books) that the boys initially protest but in the end like it as much as the girls, or as one teacher told me recently, “the boys were even bigger fans than the girls.”
Another staple in my signing line is the family. The mom and daughters get their books signed, and the mom confides in me, “My son reads your books on the sly” or “My son loves your books too but he’s embarrassed to admit it.” Why are they embarrassed? Because we’ve made them that way. We’ve told them in subtle ways that, in order to be a real boy, to be manly, they can’t like anything girls like.
Though sometimes those instructions aren’t subtle at all. Recently at a signing, a family had all my books. The mom had me sign one of them for each of her children. A 10-year-old boy lurked in the back. I’d signed some for all the daughters and there were more books, so I asked the boy, “Would you like me to sign one to you?” The mom said, “Yeah, Isaac, do you want her to put your name in a girl book?” and the sisters all giggled.
As you can imagine, Isaac said no.
This is where I feel called to fight sexism. in these moments where girl things are “stupid” for boys.
I can read comics and like superheroes, but he can’t enjoy books with a lead female or like dolls because THAT’S FOR GIRLS AND IT’S LAME.
No. Girl stuff is not lame. It’s just as cool as boy stuff, but sexism has put girl things in a category one step below boy things and that is unacceptable.
Liz Feuerbach, The Women of The Harry Potter Universe (via writingadvice)
Had to Reblog. I really get validated by stuff like this. Hermione, is a truly inspiring and true-to-life character.
(via shaleemae)
Girls and women of the world, could we stop apologizing for wanting and eating food? Because this is one of the most ridiculous things that we do collectively as lady-people, and not only does it annoy the shit out of me personally, but it is also INCREDIBLY SAD. Could we stop feeling “guilty” for wanting an effing brownie? Or a plate of fries? Could we stop actively seeking permission from our friends to go ahead and “be bad” and order the cheesecake? Could we all just go ahead and order whatever it is that we feel like eating, instead of saying, “Oh, I feel like a pig, you guys are just getting salads”?
Because—now I know this will come as a shock—WOMEN EAT. We get hungry. We get hungry for pizzas and Double Stuf Oreos and nachos and ice cream and giant French-toast breakfasts, and you know what? WE DON’T NEED TO FEEL BAD ABOUT THAT.
(Source: networkconnectivityproblems)
- be thin
- have a vagina
- give birth
- cook for you
- have long hair
- wear makeup
- have sex with you
- be feminine
- be graceful
- shave
- diet
- be fashionable
- wear pink
- love men
- be the media’s idea of perfection
- listen to your bullshit
Ok, if you’re like me, then:
the title + the preceding tag = too many negatives so I’m confused.
Thus, translation!
“Women don’t have to: [list].
But if they want to, they can: [list].”
:)
Why is there very little utility to women’s clothing? Why don’t we get pockets which actually open? Why do we have to put up with the ‘false pockets’ that are frequently sewn onto women’s jackets and pants to give visual interest without ruining the ‘line’ of the garment? Why, when pockets are actually present, are they so rarely large, stable, or loose enough to accommodate a phone or a wallet? And why, given this is the case, do women go on to cop so much flack for carrying handbags around with them?
Oh wait. Is this one of those double standards which we feminists are always going on about; one of those innocuous little things which everybody just accepts because it is the norm?
Women carry handbags. It is known.
But why? I have watched my male friends get ready to go out. They slip their wallet into one pocket, their keys into another, their phone into a third pocket, and some of them even still have spare pockets large enough to carry a novel for the journey. Those of my friends who wear women’s clothes, though, face an entirely different situation. If they are wearing the right jeans or jacket, they may have up to two usable pockets (not at all guaranteed). However, in most cases they won’t have any pockets at all. Utility and style rarely meet in women’s fashion, so they grab a bag.
Contrary to all the jokes, most women don’t ‘have’ to leave the house with everything they pack in their day-to-day handbag. Most of the items in a woman’s everyday handbag are in there because, if she’s going to have to carry it anyway, she might as well make it worth her while. Excuse us for making use of the one useful item we find in our wardrobes.
Three things that I love: flowers, lace, and hairy pits!
Yes: We have armpit hair. EVERYONE DOES. SO GET THE FUCK OVER IT.
