Saving Face (2012), acid attacks on women in Pakistan
Meanwhile, in America, feminists are complaining about how dress codes are oppressive.
You idiots have never experienced oppression, and pray you never do, because this is what it looks like.
As a South Asian American feminist, let me remind everyone that oppression is not a competition.
Just because we fight one type of sexism doesn’t mean we don’t care about other instances of sexism that don’t affect us directly in our day to day lives.
My heart goes out to this woman and the hundreds of other victims like her. I want to educate people about these kinds of incidents. I support organizations that help women like this.
You may think that dress code issues are trivial, but they are related to a larger issue of women’s bodily autonomy, which affects women’s health and safety.
So please, let’s try to bring awareness and bring about change instead of insulting entire groups of people because they are facing issues that are less scary than the one presented.
“oppression is not a competition”
thank you so much for this wording
Every time someone, usually a guy, complains about feminists not experiencing oppression, I can’t help but see what they are really trying to say.
“This is how men could be treating you, be grateful it’s only as bad as it is now.”
And that’s actually an attribute of abusers, I believe I read somewhere. To compare you to someone being treated worse and tell you you should be grateful you have it so good. It convinces the victim they should be silent in the face of their abuse.
It’s literally an abuse tactic.
Every time someone says something like, “You […] have never experienced oppression, and pray you never do, because this is what it looks like.” What they are saying is, “shut up, we could treat you worse if we wanted to.”
^^^^^^^^^^^
Boom.
And it’s used to divide women. Those he decided are worthy of compassion and those who just aren’t. Conveniently, those who “have it worse” usually live far away and that means he doesn’t need to do a thing about it, he doesn’t have to change his behaviour and he gets to pretend he doesn’t have anything to do with it. Ultimately, he speaks from a position of privilege and with the usual entitlement that goes with it he thinks he gets to decide what is real suffering and what isn’t. Of course he does not care one bit about this woman, he just wants to use her to silence other women which is also part of the reason why men disfigure women this way. Shame and intimidation, trauma and isolation. Sisterhood is the biggest threat to men.
Tag: important
Like, people who identify as Queer know the word is used like a slur. Trust me, we know.
So when we say “queer is a slur” was started by terfs, maybe use some critical thinking and try to understand what we mean. That is, if you actually care about queer people and the damage terfs do, rather that just screaming “queer is a slur!” and ignoring the actual point.
Terfs did not like that queer was reclaimed. End of. This is a fact. Queer was too broad, too accepting, and embraced all the people they wanted gone. And I know y’all exclusionists feel the same but get pissed when we point it out so you deny it, but sit down and listen for a minute.
Queer was the preferred term for poc. For bisexuals. For trans people. For people with multiple identities. It neatly encapsulated everything, and was a friendly community to those who felt thrown under the bus by mainstream LGBT activism. It was a political and social statement, “you treated my like I was different and weird, and guess what? I am and that’s something to be proud of.”
So the response? “You can’t use that word. Its bad. Its a slur.”
And at the time, a lot of people rolled their eyes. Everyone knew why they didn’t like the word and brushed that off. It was fine.
So they started more subtly. “Just so you know this word is very harmful and is a slur so be careful how you use it :))) in case you didn’t know :)))) its a slur :))) friendly reminder :))) for the sake of other people of course :))))” type shit on every post involving the word, including and especially posts simply mentioning self identification.
Always worded in friendly, concerned ways, like the derailment was meant to be nice and considerate, and not about normalizing their rhetoric.
And what happened because of that was a younger generation of community kids growing up with these statements being thrown at them and absorbed on every. Single. Post. That. Mentionioned. Queer.
The result? That same generation of kids cutting it all short, removing the meant-to-be-palatable niceness, to just say “queer is a slur.”
Exactly how it was originally intended. “Queer is a slur.” People drop on posts where young queer people talk about it being a self identifier that actually fits them. “Its a slur,” they comment, with nothing else, on posts they clearly didn’t read past that word, written by people twice their age who had reclaimed it before they were even born.
Its nasty. Its disgusting. It’s plain old bigotry, whether the people saying know it or not. It is a terf tactic, plain and simple.
And no one wants to deny that it is indeed used as a slur (right along with all the rest of our identities.) No one wants to be insensitive and force it on people who haven’t reclaimed it.
But invading queer people’s posts to spit “queer is a slur” is flat out queerphobic. You do the dirty work of terfs, of cis straight oppressors, by saying in one simple sentence: “its a dirty word, there is no pride in it, you haven’t/can’t reclaim(ed) it.”
And regardless of your actual intentions, when you do this, that is EXACTLY what you are communicating and doing.
“Queer is a slur” is a terf movement. Stop fucking supporting terfs just because you want to pretend like it isn’t.
This is why I block people who say ‘Queer is a slur.’
You quack like a terf, I block you like a terf.
This thing was so weird to me when I first encountered it on tumblr, because like… in academia
queer studies
is a thing. Queer Theory is a thing. If I search my Uni’s library for ‘queer’ I get 138,481 results. Here are some of them:
- Queer in Europe : contemporary case studies / edited by Lisa Downing and Robert Gillett.
- Queer Phenomenology, Sexual Orientation, and Health Care Spaces: Learning From the Narratives of Queer Women and Nurses in Primary Health Care, / Cressida Heyes, Megan Dean, Lisa Goldberg.
- Playing With Time: Gay Intergenerational Performance Work and the Productive Possibilities of Queer Temporalities / Stephen Farrier
- Postcolonial and queer theories : intersections and essays / edited by John C. Hawley.
- Queer Dickens : erotics, families, masculinities / Holly Furneaux.
- Showing Your Pride: A National Survey of Queer Student Centres in Canadian Colleges and Universities / John Ecker, Jennifer Rae, Amandeep Bassi
- Mad for Foucault : rethinking the foundations of queer theory / Lynne Huffer.
Do those look like queerphobic texts? And do you think that most of the writers writing about queer theory are straight? Lols. If you don’t want to be personally be called queer, that’s cool. You don’t get to stop other people using the word though. It’s ours now and we’re keeping it.
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino, 2009)
Telling a woman who says she doesn’t want kids “You’ll change your mind” is really shitty because
- it’s assigning motherhood to a person who is explicitly rejecting it
- it’s reinforcing gender roles
- it makes motherhood out to be something you do because you have to, not because you genuinely want to
- it’s infantilizing to make it seem like she can’t make decisions about her own life
- it’s invalidating of her desires which she is capable of knowing and communicating
- it’s telling a grown woman that you know what she wants better than she does
^^^^^^^^ take notes ^^^^^^^^
A New Normal: Ten Things I’ve Learned About Trauma
by
Catherine Woodiwiss1. Trauma permanently changes us.
This is the big, scary truth about trauma: there is no such thing as
“getting over it.” The five stages of grief model marks universal stages
in learning to accept loss, but the reality is in fact much bigger: a
major life disruption leaves a new normal in its wake. There is no “back
to the old me.” You are different now, full stop.This is not a wholly negative thing. Healing from trauma can also
mean finding new strength and joy. The goal of healing is not a
papering-over of changes in an effort to preserve or present things as
normal. It is to acknowledge and wear your new life — warts, wisdom, and
all — with courage.2. Presence is always better than distance.
There is a curious illusion that in times of crisis people “need
space.” I don’t know where this assumption originated, but in my
experience it is almost always false. Trauma is a disfiguring, lonely
time even when surrounded in love; to suffer through trauma alone is
unbearable. Do not assume others are reaching out, showing up, or
covering all the bases.It is a much lighter burden to say, “Thanks for your love, but please
go away,” than to say, “I was hurting and no one cared for me.” If
someone says they need space, respect that. Otherwise, err on the side
of presence.3. Healing is seasonal, not linear.
It is true that healing happens with time. But in the recovery
wilderness, emotional healing looks less like a line and more like a
wobbly figure-8. It’s perfectly common to get stuck in one stage for
months, only to jump to another end entirely … only to find yourself
back in the same old mud again next year.Recovery lasts a long, long time. Expect seasons.
4. Surviving trauma takes “firefighters” and “builders.” Very few people are both.
This is a tough one. In times of crisis, we want our family, partner,
or dearest friends to be everything for us. But surviving trauma
requires at least two types of people: the crisis team — those friends
who can drop everything and jump into the fray by your side, and the
reconstruction crew — those whose calm, steady care will help nudge you
out the door into regaining your footing in the world. In my experience,
it is extremely rare for any individual to be both a firefighter and a
builder. This is one reason why trauma is a lonely experience. Even if
you share suffering with others, no one else will be able to fully walk
the road with you the whole way.A hard lesson of trauma is learning to forgive and love your partner,
best friend, or family even when they fail at one of these roles.
Conversely, one of the deepest joys is finding both kinds of companions
beside you on the journey.5. Grieving is social, and so is healing.
For as private a pain as trauma is, for all the healing that time and
self-work will bring, we are wired for contact. Just as relationships
can hurt us most deeply, it is only through relationship that we can be
most fully healed.It’s not easy to know what this looks like — can I trust casual
acquaintances with my hurt? If my family is the source of trauma, can
they also be the source of healing? How long until this friend walks
away? Does communal prayer help or trivialize?Seeking out shelter in one another requires tremendous courage, but
it is a matter of life or paralysis. One way to start is to practice
giving shelter to others.6. Do not offer platitudes or comparisons. Do not, do not, do not.
“I’m so sorry you lost your son, we lost our dog last year … ” “At
least it’s not as bad as … ” “You’ll be stronger when this is over.”
“God works in all things for good!”When a loved one is suffering, we want to comfort them. We offer
assurances like the ones above when we don’t know what else to say. But
from the inside, these often sting as clueless, careless, or just plain
false.Trauma is terrible. What we need in the aftermath is a friend who can
swallow her own discomfort and fear, sit beside us, and just let it be
terrible for a while.7. Allow those suffering to tell their own stories.
Of course, someone who has suffered trauma may say, “This made me
stronger,” or “I’m lucky it’s only (x) and not (z).” That is their
prerogative. There is an enormous gulf between having someone else
thrust his unsolicited or misapplied silver linings onto you, and
discovering hope for one’s self. The story may ultimately sound very
much like “God works in all things for good,” but there will be a galaxy
of disfigurement and longing and disorientation in that confession.
Give the person struggling through trauma the dignity of discovering and
owning for himself where, and if, hope endures.8. Love shows up in unexpected ways.
This is a mystifying pattern after trauma, particularly for those in
broad community: some near-strangers reach out, some close friends
fumble to express care. It’s natural for us to weight expressions of
love differently: a Hallmark card, while unsatisfying if received from a
dear friend, can be deeply touching coming from an old acquaintance.Ultimately every gesture of love, regardless of the sender, becomes a
step along the way to healing. If there are beatitudes for trauma, I’d
say the first is, “Blessed are those who give love to anyone in times of
hurt, regardless of how recently they’ve talked or awkwardly
reconnected or visited cross-country or ignored each other on the
metro.” It may not look like what you’d request or expect, but there
will be days when surprise love will be the sweetest.9. Whatever doesn’t kill you …
In 2011, after a publically humiliating year, comedian Conan O’Brien gave students at Dartmouth College the following warning:
“Nietzsche famously said, ‘Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you
stronger.’ … What he failed to stress is that it almost kills you.”
Odd things show up after a serious loss and creep into every corner of
life: insatiable anxiety in places that used to bring you joy,
detachment or frustration towards your closest companions, a deep
distrust of love or presence or vulnerability.There will be days when you feel like a quivering, cowardly shell of
yourself, when despair yawns as a terrible chasm, when fear paralyzes
any chance for pleasure. This is just a fight that has to be won, over
and over and over again.10. … Doesn’t kill you.
Living through trauma may teach you resilience. It may help sustain
you and others in times of crisis down the road. It may prompt humility.
It may make for deeper seasons of joy. It may even make you stronger.It also may not.
In the end, the hope of life after trauma is simply that you have
life after trauma. The days, in their weird and varied richness, go on.
So will you.
Repeat after me:
– Veganism is not affordable
– Veganism is not cruelty free
– Veganism is not the best choice for everyoneRepeat after me
-I’m an idiot and wrong.
-Veganism can be made affordable.
–Veganism is fucking cruelty free. That’s what it’s all about.
– Veganism is the best choice for everyone, if everyone did it.
-I’m a fucking asshole for making this completely wrong text post and should shut the hell up now.Exploiting undocumented immigrants, and other workers is cruelty free?
Nearly 500,000 children as young as six harvest 25 percent of US crops.But I guess brown people don’t fucking matter.
People are literally starving in South America because all the Quinoa crop is being exported mainly for white vegans who want to live “cruelty-free” but don’t care about brown people as much as they do about animals.
plus, 4 of the 8 most common food allergies (soy, wheat, peanuts, and tree nuts) are common vegan substitutes.
o shit
i would literally starve to death if i couldn’t eat cheese or meats because my body cannot process nuts as they are too rough on my intestines and cause inflammation
Veganism is incredibly expensive depending on where you live, mostly if there are no local farms near you. Plant food prices skyrocket, and food deserts exist.
Veganism is not even close to cruelty free. You cannot be cruelty free in this country (USA) unless you 100% grow your own food because we use slave labor to pick it. Plus this doesn’t factor in all the harm being caused by the transport of your food, by the truck that carried it around.
Veganism is not the best choice for everyone, because some people cannot survive off of a plant based diet. I had tried for a good while, and my chronic illnesses spiked from it. Plus the constant monitoring to make sure I was receiving adequate nutrients triggered my ED to hell and back.
Veganism is a great way to start lowering your negative effect on the planet, but that is all it is, a starting place. Your work is not done just because you became vegan and you do not get to throw stones at others because you still live in a glass house.
Furthermore – it is absolutely possible to lower your footprint while still consuming animal products – you just have to be selective about what kinds and where they are sourced from. I have a permaculture based garden planned out for when we get land that actually has a smaller footprint than the typical vegan who buys everything at a store does.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Actually, none of us can survive on a plant-based diet. We cannot manufacture B12, and the so-called “plant-based” sources of B12, it turns out, don’t produce it in a form we can digest.
B12 is found in all animal products.
Additionally, although humans can manufacture taurine (only found in meat), not all of us can manufacture enough taurine. This is why some people get sick when they go vegetarian.
To survive on a vegan diet you need to artificially supplement B12 and possibly taurine. Period.
A diet that requires artificial supplementation is, by definition, unhealthy. And while the cost of vegan B12 supplements is low, when you’re already paying more for your food… Taurine supplementation, if you happen to be one of the people who needs it, is another added expense and hassle. A few vegans have also found it necessary to supplement carnitine, which is considerably more expensive. Oh, and most vegans don’t get enough calcium and end up with bone problems. Many are also Vitamin D deficient, especially if living at high latitudes, if dark skinned, or if religiously using sunscreen. And Vitamin D2 (plant derived) is not as easily absorbed as D3 (which ONLY comes from animals), so you need even more of it.
Then there’s protein.
I personally cannot properly digest nuts. I react the way lactose intolerant people do to milk if I consume pistachios, walnuts, or pecans. Almonds are actively toxic to me. Hazelnuts mess with my brain.
Because I am on thyroid medication, I am not supposed to consume large quantities of soy, as it can make my thyroid worse, throwing off my dosage. I can have some, but I cannot use it as a major protein source. This is also true for trans men (the phytoestrogens intefere with testosterone therapy), cis men with low testosterone (same reason) and women with a family history of breast cancer (elevates risk). Excessive soy consumption has also been linked to early puberty in girls (Again, phytoestrogens) and reproductive/sexual problems in both sexes. Eating a bit of soy is fine, but tofu should not be used as a meat substitute except for the occasional meal.
This limits my access to non-animal proteins to beans and grains. If I was gluten intolerant as well (I’m not, but it’s in my family), it would be a real problem. The only dairy substitute available to me is rice milk (and rice causes many of the same problems environmentally as raising beef).
Oh, but it’s better for the environment, right?
Nope.
In addition to the already-mentioned quinoa, we’re cutting down rain forest in Mexico to grow avocados. Rice production is almost as bad for the environment as factory-based beef production for similar reasons. Also, plant-based foods, esp. fruit and fresh vegetables, are more likely to end up being wasted.
Studies indicate that if we all gave up meat tomorrow, all 7 billion of us gave up animal products forever, the good side would be the reduction in antibiotic use and greenhouse gas emissions.
How about the bad side?
1.3 billion people would lose their jobs overnight. 1.3 billion. 987 of them are poor.
Another thing that Ban Eating Meat Tomorrow types forget is that veganism is not necessarily the most effective use of farmland.
Uh, what?
The statement that if everyone switched to a vegan diet we would need a fraction of our current farmland assumes all farmland is created equal.
It simply is not.
I suspect that a lot of this perspective either comes from city dwellers who have no clue about farming or from people in the US breadbasket where there is a lot of high quality farmland suitable for raising food for humans.
The last global census in 2008 said that at that time, if all 6 billion people went vegan, it would need 3,068,444,911 acres of arable land. At the time there was about 3,212,369,959 acres of arable land: That is to say land suitable for raising crops humans can eat.
However, we’re building on, or otherwise destroying, arable land at the rate of about 1% a year and the population has grown.
We literally do not have enough arable land to feed everyone a plant-based diet.
And there are parts of the world that have a worse proportion of arable land to land only suitable for pasture than the US. Scotland comes immediately to mind. People in these places would have to import most of their food. I’m not sure Iceland could survive without eating fish.
If we all gave up eating meat tomorrow many of us would starve. I’m not exaggerating or being alarmist.
I’m also not criticizing people who choose not to eat animal products (just please make sure you get the required nutrients).
I am criticizing the “I don’t eat animal products and nobody else should either” crowd. Because it’s not that simple.
Also, bluntly, vitamin B12 deficiency can cause mood disturbances and paranoia…
But again, if you have to consume artificial supplements for whatever reason (unless it’s a personal absorption issue) your diet is not healthy.
Sorry, it’s just not.
READ THIS
READ THIS GODDAMIT
A brilliant explanation of consent for anyone who STILL doesn’t get it.
It makes me sick to my stomach that we have to explain this so thoroughly.
Even sicker that you don’t have to use a grand amount for the metaphor, not $1000, not even $20. Men can understand the store of value of $5 more than they can understand the concept of women as humans.
I think what’s saddest about the whole thing is that it always has to be a metaphor about an object for them to get it. Like the classic comparison to someone getting robbed because they were dressed rich so they were asking for it.
The only understand when women are compared to objects because that’s what they see is as.
A Biology Teacher Just Destroyed Every Excuse for Transphobia With Cold, Hard Facts
This is AMAZING. The teacher’s rebuttal:
I just commented this on a transphobic post that was all like, “In a sexual species, females have two X chromosomes and males have an X and a Y, I’m not a bigot it’s just science.” I’m a science teacher so I responded with this.
First of all, in a sexual species, you can have females be XX and males be X (insects), you can have females be ZW and males be ZZ (birds), you can have females be females because they developed in a warm environment and males be males because they developed in a cool environment (reptiles), you can have females be females because they lost a penis sword fighting contest (some flatworms), you can have males be males because they were born female, but changed sexes because the only male in their group died (parrotfish and clownfish), you can have males look and act like females because they are trying to get close enough to actual females to mate with them (cuttlefish, bluegills, others), or you can be one of thousands of sexes (slime mold, some mushrooms.) Oh, did you mean humans? Oh ok then. You can be male because you were born female, but you have 5-alphareductase deficiency and so you grew a penis at age 12. You can be female because you have an X and a Y chromosome but you are insensitive to androgens, and so you have a female body. You can be female because you have an X and a Y chromosome but your Y is missing the SRY gene, and so you have a female body. You can be male because you have two X chromosomes, but one of your X’s HAS an SRY gene, and so you have a male body. You can be male because you have two X chromosomes- but also a Y. You can be female because you have only one X chromosome at all. And you can be male because you have two X chromosomes, but your heart and brain are male. And vice – effing – versa. Don’t use science to justify your bigotry. The world is way too weird for that shit.
Addressing this to the TERF that assaulted me.
A Biology Teacher Just Destroyed Every Excuse for Transphobia With Cold, Hard Facts
Do not allow him to consume you. If he does not call, go to sleep. If he does not message, put your phone away and have a fantastic day anyway. If he acts distant when you are with him and refuses to tell you what is wrong, don’t wait for him, go home and do something you love. If he tries to insinuate you do not need your friends now that you have him, spend more time with your friends. If he tries to teach you a lesson through the silent treatment, ignore him completely.
If he plays with your feelings constantly, walk away from him. If he acts like your body is his entitlement when you are not ready, walk away from him. If he says terrible, unforgivable things and threatens to leave you after every argument, walk away from him. If he forbids you from doing anything you love, walk away from him. If he claims ownership of your accomplishments, walk away from him. If he demeans you or disrespects your being a girl and refuses to stop when you tell him it hurts, walk away from him.I cannot stress this enough, you live for yourself first. He is a secondary character in the story of your life. Do not allow him to turn you into a secondary character in your own book
Abusive men pave the way for lazy men to get wives and girlfirends.
Lemme clarify, how many times have you heard your overworked female friends and relatives say “Yeah, Jerry drinks beer every evening after work while I cook dinner and clean up after everyone and does the bare minimum to help me raise the kids but he’s such a nice guy. He’s never beat me in my life. I couldn’t ask for a better guy in my life.”
Like no, Sally, your husband is a common stone among turds and you know it.
I try to explain this conceptually to people as a thing that happens not saying that this is good but it’s a thing that happens.
This is what male privilege is and how all men benefit from it.
This is why you are not exempt from statements about “all men” even if you are overall good.
You benefit from the bar constantly being lowered by systemic issues within the gender.
The expectations on you are always lower than they should because “at least you’re not X”.
That…is the best response I’ve seen to the “not all men” thing. Thank you.
Nothing but My Aching Soul 