March 2011
1 post
October 2009
10 posts
3 tags
On girls and food...
Women aren’t trusted to make decisions about their own bodies…
The hardest thing for a girl is not the fact that her body is always on display; it is the fact that she has no rights to make decisions about her own body, especially about food.
There’s a lot of pressure on girls to eat. If she tries to say that she won’t eat, people assume that there is something wrong with her, that...
3 tags
Aboriginal Elders speak out to raise awareness...
At a recent talk at the University of Sydney, Aboriginal elders Richard Downs and Harry Nelson offered their perspectives on the Northern Territory Intervention. Many people in the audience were well aware of the issues, but unfortunately for many Sydney-siders, news of the Intervention has been a confusing muddle of contradictory reports.
Richard and Harry believe that the walk-off is the only...
Notes on giving birth...
On the ferry, the mothers with their babies strapped to their stomachs make arrangements for the transferral of prams; folded up, carried onto the ferry. A woman in earth coloured cloth says goodbye to her friends. They try to get a smile out of the baby. Its head wrapped in a green woollen beanie. The mother’s eyes are beautiful and almond shaped, her lips pink and pretty, her teeth crooked. The...
2 tags
Single Gender Education
I went to an all girls school and a coed school. At the coed school, the girls spent all their time trying to impress the boys with makeup, mini-skirts and see-through shirts, whereas at the girl’s school it was much more relaxed with no need to impress anyone and more focus on academic work. This could be related to a difference in public and private education, which also comes into the question...
1 tag
Why does each man kill the thing he loves?
He kills the thing he loves because he is afraid that he might lose himself to it. Afraid that in the consummation of his desire he will no longer retain any potency as a man, he will have given way to passion, become fluid, blurred his boundaries, become like a woman. Masculinity is fraught by its continual rejection of the Other. In order to be a contained self, the man must not be porous to...
Race in Beyonce and Britney's Video-Clips
Beyonce’s Single Ladies (Put a ring on it) presents layered mimicry of motion. She performs white moves appropriated from black culture and splices original black moves in-between.
Race in Beyonce’s Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)
The use of sustained long shots creates a strong stage-like presence unlike the conventional music video that splices and fragments bodies by rapid editing. The...
3 tags
You're not becoming one of those lesbians are you?
A friend rang me recently who I haven’t seen in years. As we engaged in a brief catch up session over the phone, I told him I was slowly converting to hardcore feminism and loving every moment of it. His reply was confusing at first, then upsetting, until I later realised it was downright disgusting. He responded:
“Oh you’re not becoming one of those lesbians are you? That would be such a...
3 tags
Little Red Riding Hood
For a long time fairytales have been based on, and reinforced, by binary oppositions: male/female, nature/culture, passive/active, etc. They encouraged us, as little girls, to be small, beautiful, innocent and good, and so be well loved and cherished by our daddies, and one day rescued from danger by a dashing young (white) prince.
In the Grimms version of Little Red Riding Hood, the strong,...
2 tags
The Autonomy of Feminism
My idea of feminism is that it is a fight for women’s equality with men. The key part being ‘with men’. We have to work together if we are ever to move forwards with the issues that we want to advance. The point, for me anyway, is to make a world where we can work together, rather than continuing to divide ourselves down a superficial binary that contributes to the oppression of one or other...
2 tags
Watching Women in Disney
While Disney women are all beautiful and sexually attractive to heterosexual men - due to their alluring combination of chaste passivity with sexual responsiveness - this is not the main problem with Disney films.
The women are all talented, strong and independent in their own way. Snow White is resourceful and confident despite having everything taken away from her. Aurora has an incredible...