Feminism, Space, video games, Writing

Mass Effect: What Would A Matriarchy Look Like? 

Mass Effect is a great game series but it failed to create a non-gendered alien race, let alone a matriarchal one. To be honest, I struggle to realistically imagine the full depth of what a matriarchal society would look like. In the context of Mass Effect, it means looking at the evolution of humanity without men, let alone… Continue reading Mass Effect: What Would A Matriarchy Look Like? 

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Feminism, Magical Girls, The Blog, Writing

Magical Girls: Internalised Misogyny and Genre Rebirth

Let’s be honest. The ‘magical girl’ trope used to suck when I was a kid, especially when girls are taught to hate themselves because ‘femininity = weakness,’ and gosh are magical-girl-shows ALL ABOUT showy associations of girliness. As such, the magical girl trope only pleased young girls who hadn’t yet learnt to think ‘girliness is… Continue reading Magical Girls: Internalised Misogyny and Genre Rebirth

Feminism, Politics

6 things that happen when you write about feminism

Another reblog this morning. This time it’s a little bit of motivational talk to keep you writing where everyone else would tell you to stop.

Sarah Ditum

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1. You will be accused of hating men

At first this will sound ridiculous. Then you’ll feel irritated. Then you might feel riled and want to say: “YES I HATE MEN AND THEY MUST ALL BECOME SOYLENT GREEN.”

But the truth is, I don’t hate men. I just think I am awesome – too awesome for my life to be decided along the lines of what someone else thinks is appropriate to my gender. Too awesome to go around cringing over the fact that I am woman-shaped and have woman interests and woman-y inside-bits.

The people who accuse feminism of hating men have a very fragile, narrow idea of being a man – they’re something like a fluorescent tube. They are worried that any change will shatter them. Feel sorry for them, but not too sorry: like the rest of us, they will probably be OK.

2. You will get…

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Feminism, Politics, The Internet

Ironic Sexism Is Still Sexism

There is so much about Foz Meadows’s blog that I love and find comforting to see addressed. Her entire blog is a big stress relief for me, but I’m reblogging this particular post because it is something I struggle with constantly when around my family.

Explaining that sexist/racist jokes are STILL sexist never sits well with them. They will always tell me, in a derisive and offended tone, that I need to ‘lighten up’ or, my favourite (not), ‘get off my high horse’ and learn to ‘take a joke’ or explain to me that they’re being ‘ironic’.

I suppose they dislike it that I scowl at belittling and sexist/racist jokes because, for them, they would have to completely alter their way of thinking about humour. They would have to address that they’ve just said something that either reveals a little bit of their internalised misogyny, or that they are bigoted and not aware of it.

Changing how one thinks about humour does require effort, but only in the beginning, like all things. If they TRIED to be conscious of the ‘ironic sexism’ that they’re perpetuating, they might find it easier not to give into the mindless rhetoric that bigotry is funny. It’s easy to just laugh rather than to think, but the effect this keeps having on the way we subconsciously treat people continues to have negative results.

To quote Meadows’s opening paragraph: ‘All too often, gross remarks – be they racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise abusive and vile – are excused or condoned on the grounds of irony; that because they were meant to be humorous, they can’t possibly be offensive. And if somebody is offended, then they’re either oversensitive or incapable of laughter – either way, though, the problem is with them, not the joke-teller.

Except that, no: it’s not.’

shattersnipe: malcontent & rainbows

All too often, gross remarks – be they racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise abusive and vile – are excused or condoned on the grounds of irony; that because they were meant to be humorous, they can’t possibly be offensive. And if somebody is offended, then they’re either oversensitive or incapable of laughter – either way, though, the problem is with them, not the joke-teller.

Except that, no: it’s not.

Generally speaking, there are two reasons why people make ironically offensive jokes: either they think we live in such a post-racist, post-sexist, post-discriminatory world that the act of mimicking historical abuses cannot possibly reinforce those abuses, on account of how they no longer really exist; or they secretly think the stereotypes which underlie offensive jokes have some basis in reality, and are therefore funny because they’re true. The former person can be anything from genuinely well-intentioned but oblivious to belligerently convinced…

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Feminism, Politics, Reading

Fifty Shades of Feminism

This has to be the best "Fifty Shades" marketing pun out there. That's it, they don't get better or more tongue in cheek than this. Now stop. But I'm not posting this to rage about marketing puns, or Fifty Shades of Gray. I want to share with you a new book. A fantastic book. A… Continue reading Fifty Shades of Feminism