Post at Provoketive.com

I was born near the end of second-wave feminism. As a result, as a young-adult, I had all kinds of powerful female role models and I was very complacent about the rights that I had as a woman.

This was a mistake.

Today at Provoketive, I apologize to the feminists that went before me for not being more vigilant. Head on over to read my piece.

To My Sons on International Women's Day

Dear, dear boys,

It's International Women's Day, so it would seem to make sense that I would write to your sisters today. But when have I ever done what makes sense?

No, my sons, I'm writing to you because you will be the ones with the power and privilege and you need to know how to use that to make the world better for your sisters and for all of the women that you meet.

You both already have such tender hearts and I love you for that. It makes me proud that you recognize the humanity in the people that you interact with. I wish you'd keep your room cleaner, but this is pretty good too.

Some day soon, you're going to hear another boy in your class say mean things about a girl. Not because she was mean first, but just because she's a girl. And you're going to have to make a decision about how to respond.

You can join in, you can be quiet, or you can ask them to stop. That last one is hard to do. Standing up to your peers can be scary and can leave you in the place where you will be teased or called names as well. I really do get that.

But you have more strength than you know. When you stand up for girls, you are helping other boys make that choice. It might take a while for you (and them) to see that, but it's what you're doing. You're paving the way for others to stand up against negativity when they see it. You're allowing them to know that they don't have to be negative themselves.

As you get older, people are going to tell you that men and women are already treated equally and that feminism isn't something that you need to concern yourself with, especially as a man. In a lot of ways, we are seeing equality. And I hope that as you're older, that will be even more the case.

But when you happen upon inequality, I hope that you'll notice. If you don't notice on your own (and it's okay if you don't - we can't all see everything), I hope that you'll pay attention if someone points it out to you. And I hope that you'll do what you can to change it. It might be something small, it might be something big. Know that making the effort is far more important than the size of the effort.

I know that being 8 and 11 year old boys, you're not thinking about what today means. That's okay. Enjoy what you love. Play Minecraft and Zelda. Run around outside. Stay up too late talking in bed. Be boys.

And when the time comes, remember your power and use it well.

All my love, Mom

Advertising Mister-y

The trailer for Miss Representation has been getting a lot of play over the past week and I applaud that. It is a powerful eight minutes and if you haven't taken the time to watch it, I highly recommend it. The way the media handles women is appalling and we can't do anything about it unless we're aware.

There is an incredibly sexist ad out right now that has really had my ire raised for a while. See below:



No, there are no boobs flashing. No girl is being told that she can't do what her male counterpoint can. There's nothing in this ad that is overtly sexist.

If you're a girl, anyway.

But in addition to being the mother of two daughters, I'm also the mother of two'of sons. And I've got to tell you, ads like the above hurt all of my kids.

That ad tells my sons that if they marry a strong woman, they are going to be emasculated for every decision that they make. It tells them that if they don't make a certain level of money, their wives are going to resent them. It tells them that they are perceived as stupid and untrustworthy.

I definitely want to see change happen for my daughters. I want them to know that they can do absolutely anything that they want. But I don't want that change to happen at the expense of my sons. Advancement that is achieved strictly by tearing down the perceived competition leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

AT&T asks us to rethink possible. I'm going to ask them to rethink running ads that make men and women look like assholes. Is that possible?

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What do you think? Can we achieve some level of equality by simply by treating people well rather than tearing down those who are on top? Do you have a sexist ad that you want to rant about?

JCPenney and Insidious Sexism

On Wednesday, social media was alight with this ghastly long-sleeve tee from JCPenney:

If you can't read it, it says, "I'm too pretty to do homework so my brother has to do it for me."
The product description says, "Who has time for homework when there's a new Justin Bieber album out?"

Mom bloggers, dad bloggers, as well as many people with significantly larger brains than the marketing folks at JCPenney were quick to flood them with requests to remove the shirt, and to their credit, they did indeed take it down. (Of course, this gem is still available. *sigh*)

My initial response to this was rage. Who the hell approved this hot mess? I mean, really, who? Because I'd like to smack them.

Later, a group of us tried some humor and wisdom with the hashtag #PutThatOnATShirtJCPenney. These are some of my favorites (and yes, I totally included one of my own):

There were a number of additional suggestions, including quotes from Margaret Mead, Eleanor Roosevelt, Tina Fey, and Anne Frank, among others. It was a good time and I recommend giving it a look-see.

In the midst of this conversation, my friend Preston Yancey pointed out this delight, a stripper pole for kids (yeah, you probably don't wanna' click on the link). Now don't get me wrong. This is appalling. It's gross and 100% inappropriate. 

But it doesn't bother me like the t-shirt.

See, that's easy sexism to spot. I see "kiddie stripper pole" and say, "Hey daughters, don't let your highest aspiration be stripperdom." Brush the hands and we're done. Certainly there are more nuanced discussions about it to have, but at face value, everyone can point to that and say, "Sexist and inappropriate."

The t-shirt is a bit more tricky.

After all, being pretty isn't a bad thing. I can't very well point to the t-shirt and say, "Don't be pretty!" That's silly. My daughters ARE pretty.

And so girls see this and while it might stir something "off" in them, they can't place their finger on it. As a result, they sit quietly by or laugh at it and let its message wash over them. The message that looks matter more than brains. The message that boys are smarter than girls. The message that intellect and appearance are inextricably linked (and that if one rises, the other falls). The message that boys are just here to be manipulated. The message that your sexuality is what will get you ahead.

These messages and hundreds just like them attack my children every day. Sometimes they're boulders hurling at them in an avalanche and they can see them coming, but more often, they're small little erosive events that wear away at their self-worth, leaving them feeling less than the person they should be.

And when we stay silent, we let it happen. When we feel as though we're obligated to choose between one kind of exploitation of women and another, we let it happen. When we make excuses or suggest that it's no big deal, we let it happen.

In the grand scheme of things, it's not a big deal. There are far worse ways that women are exploited all the time. But I cannot stand by and watch my children's ability to see their value be worn away by the erosion of insidious sexism.

I'm too pretty and smart to let that happen.

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What examples of sexism have you seen recently that you were tempted to brush off? How do you teach your kids or yourself to recognize it when you see it?

Celebrate Women: That About Wraps It Up

photo © 2008 Voldy Morton | more info (via: Wylio)
As we wrap up our month of posts about women's issues, the question we're posing today is how to raise awareness of women's issues both locally and globally. I figure that should be easily answered in a blog post. Done and done.

Oh, wait.

I wish it could be so simple. That just reading a post about feminist parenting could erase all inequity. That reading about how women inspire one another creatively would free all women to pursue creativity. That celebrating women through blogging could easily translate to all women celebrating themselves without shame.

Sadly it's not that simple.

There will still be women who doubt that they have anything to offer to their communities. There will still be children raised in homes where boys are valued more than girls. There will still be women who are ashamed to embrace their strength and femininity in equal parts.

But we can help it change.

We can encourage one another. Men, women, children. We celebrate not only women, but all people. Because the more I understand my own value, the more I can help others recognize the value that they have. The more that I embrace my own gifts and talents, the more I can help others find ways they can contribute. The more I love my unique qualities as a woman, the more I can help other women embrace that in themselves.

Before we can celebrate women, we must celebrate ourselves.

Celebrate Women: Wait, She's a GIRL?!?

photo © 1920 George Eastman House | more info (via: Wylio)
I didn't know that one of my favorite books was written by a woman.

My dad was an English teacher and he often gave me extra books to read outside of my required reading from school. One of the books that he gave me was The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. I loved the book and read it in one or two sittings. I was probably 13 and I knew that the book had been written by a 16 year old, but for some reason, I totally missed that the someone was a girl.

What I learned from Hinton was that you didn't have to write "like a girl" just because you were a girl. As someone who doesn't have a particularly feminine writing voice, it's always been encouraging to me to go back to that book and remember that there isn't a single way that women are supposed to write and that the best thing we can do is to be true to our own writing style.

In recent years, probably the most influential writer has been Rachel Held Evans. My dear friend Tina linked me over to her blog a couple of years ago with this post and I've been a fan ever since. I've said more than once that she writes what I would write if I were significantly more eloquent (well, I've said it worse than that, but after Tamara's post yesterday, I'm trying to correct that). I read her and feel like I'm looking in a very flattering mirror. Of course, because her picture was at the top of her blog, I knew she was a woman.

She was one of the first authors that I read who dealt with the issue of doubt at a time when it was screaming at me in all caps. I saw someone who had a very similar up-bringing to me who ran into doubt for similar reasons as me. She writes in a way that makes me feel like we've been friends forever (and I'm quite sure that if we knew each other back in the day, we would have totally been bffs). Her content has challenged me to be more honest with myself as a writer and her voice has helped me to find a way to bring that honesty out in a more kind and gentle manner. I loved her first book (Evolving in Monkey Town) and am totally stoked about her next project.

These women have taught me that we don't have to write in a girlie voice or about girlie topics to still be a successful, influential woman writer. I appreciate that I have the opportunity to have learned from them, even if I didn't know one of them was a woman.

Celebrate Women: Boys and Girls Rule and Drool

I never expected to be a parent. When I was in high school and we filled out our "what will you be doing in 10 years" thing as seniors, I was among the very few who didn't have anything about being a wife or mom. So imagine my surprise when, a month later, I met the guy that I was going to marry. And then our extreme surprise when 9 months after we were wed, I was pregnant with our first. And our redonkulously extreme surprise five years later when we had four kids under five in the house. I don't think there are words to describe it (obviously, since I used the made-up word "redonkulous").

I hadn't really given any thought to parenting at all, let alone feminist parenting, so that was strike one. Strike two is that I've never been much of a planner, so the idea of actually having a specific method of feminist parenting makes me get a little sweaty.

Regardless of my lack of preparedness to be a feminist parent, I think that has kind of happened anyway, mostly because I've found that as a parent of two boys and two girls, the rivalry between the sexes is fairly inevitable. And rarely pretty.

As feminist parents (and my husband is firmly in favor of equality, so it's a joint effort), we want to see our children treat all people, regardless of their differences, with respect and dignity. And we want to see each of our children grow into adults who are doing what best suits them, not what gender roles best suits them. We know that life doesn't always hand us exactly what we think we want, but we also believe that our kids shouldn't have to choose from a narrow group of fields. Of course, it makes me smile when my daughter chooses something like fairy princess, but nevertheless. If that's her choice, I'm good with that.

Of course, we can never really be sure if our kids are learning the ideals that we're hoping to instill in them, but every now and again we get glimpses that it's working. I'm reminded of a moment years ago when my oldest was first starting school.

One of the not-so-great-things about sending your child away from you is that they can pick up some unattractive phrases from their peers. My daughter came home one day chanting, "Girls rule, boys drool!" Of course, as a feminist mom of both girls AND boys, I commented that it was not okay to say that in our home. It took a few times correcting her when she'd say it, but eventually I heard it less.

One afternoon we were sitting around playing a board game. My oldest son had a lucky roll of the dice and he looked up and said, "Boys...and girls are equal!"

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This is a part of the Celebrate Women blogathon! Check the link below and link up your own story about feminist parenting today!

Celebrate Women: I Know It When I See It

photo © 2009 mollypop | more info (via: Wylio)
I'm sitting here looking at today's topic for our Women's History Month blogathon and I'm absolutely drawing a blank (we won't talk about how I put off writing this post until this morning instead of working on it for the past few weeks, since I've known it was coming up!). I guess I never  really thought much about what it means to be a strong woman. I grew up surrounded by them, but never thought much about actually defining what it IS. For me it's always been kind of an "I know it when I see it" sort of thing.

So where does one see a strong woman? What does she look like to me?

She's the woman who cares for the elderly, not just because it's her job, but because she genuinely cares about making their life better.

She's the woman who stares down cancer and rather than becoming bitter, she chooses gentleness and compassion.

She's the woman who looks at her special needs child and sees, not his shortcomings, but his strengths.

She's the woman who sees a male dominated field and rather than complain, simply brings awareness to females in the same field.

She's the woman who raises her daughter alone, goes to school to become a minister and who marries again, not because she's supposed to, but because she wants to.

She's the woman who stays up late on the phone helping a friend even though she has to wake up in a couple of hours to go to work for her family.

She's the woman who embraces who she is, even when she's told that it's not okay to be who she is.

She's the woman who sees timidity and fear in her life, looks at those things and says, No, I choose honesty and courage instead.

Women of integrity. Women of boldness. Women of grace. Women of love.

This is where I see a strong woman.

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Do you see yourself or a woman that you know in the above description? How would you define a strong woman?

Celebrate Women: Couch "Potatoe" Feminist

At the end of my senior year of high school, the Vice President of the United States of America took a single mother to task. In one of the more famous "real life meets fiction" moments, Dan Quayle called out Murphy Brown, a fictional news reporter on a television show of the same name, because the character was single, pregnant, and choosing to have the child alone. The thought of a smart, successful woman raising a child by herself was apparently a threat to family values.

At the time that Murphy was in her heyday, my other favorite show, Designing Women, was winding down. Here was a show about a group of women -- married, divorced, widowed -- working together, laughing together, crying together. They addressed issues like domestic abuse, HIV/AIDS, mental illness, homosexuality, birth control -- and that was just the first season.

During high school, week after week, my best friend Tina and I would sit together and discuss the latest happenings on these shows. And while we were watching primarily for entertainment, these shows were teaching us how to be strong, compassionate, thinking women.

I never really talked about feminism with my mom. She's an incredible woman who has influenced me greatly, but I can't recall any conversations with her specifically about feminism or women's rights. I don't think my sisters or I spent time talking about it. Honestly, in my formative years, I don't remember any discussions with anyone about feminism.

But at the lunch table, in physics, after school, Tina and I would be talking about issues that were shaping us. We would marvel at Murphy's ability to be a part of the old boy's club while not losing her femininity. We would laugh about Mary Jo getting fake boobs and instead of feeling more demure, becoming really aggressive. We would swoon over Julia's most recent rant against whatever injustice she encountered that week. I think we both wanted to grow up to be any one of those women.

What has amazed me is that while I'm certainly not exactly like any one of those women, I've picked up a number of the traits that they modeled. Empathy. Compassion. Humor. Grace. Courage.

I was talking to Tina just this morning, trying to find a video clip for the post (which sadly, we couldn't find), and we started reminiscing a bit about these shows and just our general thoughts about feminism, and she said something really profound. She believes (and I totally agree) that feminism is just believing that women and men are equal. Not the same, but equal. And that when we're born, our default setting is feminist. Whatever stories and lessons we learn along the way are simply taking us closer to or further away from our natural tendencies of trust and acceptance.

All I know is that if being a feminist is cheering when Murphy Brown cuddles with her newborn son, and badly sings Natural Woman to him, sign me up.

Celebrating Women

Yesterday I was speaking with a couple of the #coffeeclub ladies on Twitter and Veronica mentioned that next month is Women's History Month and that perhaps some of us should celebrate that on our blogs. Sarah Askins and I were both on board with that, so we hammered out a few details and decided that each Wednesday in March, we would write about a specific topic as related to women. Here is our tentative schedule (as women, we retain the right to change our minds):

• March 2 -- We will be sharing personal narratives on how we became or are becoming stronger women.
• March 9 -- We will be discussing views on strong women and/or feminism.
• March 16 -- We will be writing about feminist parenting. How can we help our sons and daughters (or any young people that we meet, if one is not a parent) have a healthy view toward women.
• March 23 -- We will be focusing on an influential woman writer. One who has influenced our own writing or our thoughts about writing.
• March 30 -- We will wrap up the month by talking about ways we can each have a positive effect on women's issues locally and perhaps even globally.

We would love it if you would consider joining us in writing about these topics next month. Each of us will be hosting a linky on our blogs so you can read our posts and you can add your own as well. And if you're on Twitter, you can follow the hashtag #CelebrateWomen to see what else we find that is pertinent to this month.