I’ve started seriously working on a short play. I’m really not sure where it’s going, but the characters refuse to leave my head until I define who they are and why they matter. Writing things out is a little frustrating.

Still waiting on 5 of my 7 textbooks to be delivered. Arghhhhh. I hate the campus postal system.

Having so much freedom is amazing, though. I am digging it.

In about a month, I’ll be 18.

I still don’t feel like a woman.

When I first hit puberty, I was the opposite of style. I wore literally the same thing everyday: color-coordinated striped stretchy shirts and stretchy matching brightly-colored capris. And the same tennis shoes every day. I wouldn’t wear jeans because I thought they were too uncomfortable. I wore shitty bright red lipstick and I had very severe bangs and I came to school with wet hair. Most of that was my awkwardness with adjusting to the standard ideal of womanhood that I assumed I would someday have to adopt. I had no idea what exactly adult women did to be pretty, so I improvised with what I assumed would be good enough. I still don’t own very many beauty products, although I’ve come a very, very long way since middle school in terms of looking foxy and spectacular.

My daily beauty regime is pretty simple compared to most chicks. I wake up, take my antidepressant, hop in the shower, wash my hair, blowdry, and put on black eyeshadow. And I’m pretty much set for the day. Sometimes I’ll shave. Sometimes I won’t. And really, I’m okay with having hairy legs, most of the time.

In the media and in stores and whatall, I see a lot of stuff like creams to reduce the size of your pores, concealer, eyelash curlers, eyebrow pencils, powder to make your face less shiny. And my reaction to every single one of them is “What? WHY?” I don’t understand. When I walk into a chick store with my friends, I feel like the ugly middle school girl with ugly frizzy hair and bright red lipstick again. Am I supposed to use this? Do all the other girls use this? When I have a career, am I going to have to devote a portion of my income to buying this so that people will take me seriously and know I’m a woman?

Really, that’s probably a pretty common concern for young women growing up. And the beauty corporations know that. That’s why they advertise so heavily and make commercials that make it seem like no woman has crow’s feet and if you do then you gotta hide them cause then you will be SHUNNNNNNED. It sounds so ridiculous! And yet that’s exactly what they do. There is a lot of money in convincing women that they were built wrong.

Recently, I discovered that I have style. It isn’t particularly conventional. I hate wearing heels, for one thing. I am never gonna wear a ladies’ suit and sheer stockings and black stilletos. Nuh uh. I like wearing colors. I like tie-dyed tights and steampunk corsets and large hats and clothing that has weird cuts and leather and lace and wearing turquoise blush with neon pink lipstick and scarlet eyeshadow and I like having long blonde hair that I am never gonna cut because short hair is stupid.

I was inspired to start being as sexy and as stylish as I can be by the ever-fabulous Margaret Cho, who I will be seeing in October with my best friend Superbitch. I was watching the DVD of her tour The Notorious C.H.O, and she said this.

It’s gonna be really hard to find messages of self-love and support anywhere, especially in women’s and gay men’s culture. It’s all about how you have to look a certain way, or else you’re worthless. You know, when you look in the mirror and think, “Ugh, I’m so ugly, I’m so fat, I’m so old.” Don’t you know that’s not your authentic self? But that is billions upon billions of dollars of advertising. Magazines, movies, billboards, all geared to make you feel shitty about yourself, so you will take your hard earned money and spend it at the mall on some turn-around creme that doesn’t turn around shit.

It was like a light switch got switched on in my brain. And it was then I realised that I was done feeling bad about not being a perfect girl. It is a waste of my time to feel bad about not being conventionally pretty when I could spend that time being an unconventional hottie.

So that is my new ideal. I want to be an Unconventional Hottie. This is my manifesto on what an Unconventional Hottie is.

An Unconventional Hottie is a lady, first and foremost. She is classy in her own way. Some may call her trashy or tacky or childish, but she always looks comfortable with what she is wearing.

She can be a total chubster. She can be rail thin with a freaky nose. She can be shorter than most counters. She can have no legs. She can be Filipino.

She reads Bust Magazine for the articles AND the ads.

She works out often, as best she can, but she does not become enslaved to achieving a body type that is not her own.

She does not mind if her roots are showing.

She does not shave her pubic hair because that shit is itchy.

She boycotts companies that test on animals, because that is messed up and dogs should not wear lipstick.

She has a hobby or four that she is heavily involved in, and that she tries to bring to the masses.

She has piercings and tattooes in odd places, except for when she doesn’t.

She does not allow any of your ageist bullshit.

She does not relax her hair.

She has large, visible pores.

She believes that her body and what she does to it/for it is for her, and her alone. Not people on the street. Not her parents. Not her husband. Not her girlfriends. Not her lesbian lover. Not Rush Limbaugh.

She is, at all times, confident with her body.

She considers herself to be a total babe, even (and especially) when others tell her otherwise.

She is a thinker.

She is a lady.

This book is bound with

plastic and

cinnamon

and middle-range cologne.

Try not to inhale

because inhaling risks

include synapses of joy

floating behind your eyes;

nameless colors filling the room

with bright and heady darkness;

arms buzzing with a nameless dance;

and remembering more

than ever happened.

Farmers. Market.

August 2nd – Grab a huge pile of pictures of yourself  (ones you love, ones you hate, and the ones in between), sit down, and spend however long you have to coming up with at least one positive thing about the way you look in each picture. Scrapbook them if you want to (it’s a nice thing to look back to), do it out loud with a friend, or just complete this exercise in your head – the point is to start focusing on the positive parts of the picture, and yourself, instead of the negative things!

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This picture was taken when I was in New York this April. Mostly I just don’t like how I look fat mostly, but also I like how the light is hitting me in this picture. Also the chaos in the background is kind of cool.

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I don’t look especially good, beauty wise, but it expresses my personality very well, I’m clearly having a good time, and I’m next to someone I consider a very good friend.

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Look at my awesome hair. LOOK AT IT! It took me FOREVER to get it that way. I had to enlist help. But I like the color of my skin in this picture, even if it’s not the natural color because I’m wearing a ton of stage makeup. Also, I can rock a pair of sunglasses, even cheap ones.

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I look really, really, really good in a suit. Obviously.

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I like that, in comparison to most of my family, I look like a movie star. My hair is so much fun when it’s curly, also. I should curl it more often.

Alright, I’m done with the picspam. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Well, there’s me being silly again. Turns out womanism broke off from feminism some time during the second wave after women of color got sick of the racism in the feminist movement after how much they had contributed to feminism. I’m assuming the term “womanism” comes from the term “woman of color”, but that’s just conjecture on my part. I haven’t nearly given Womanist Musings the reading it deserves yet, but it looks like it should be a thoroughly eye-opening read.

I have only recently come to terms with the idea that I have privilege. Specifically, white privilege and cis privilege. For a good primer on what it means to have privilege, check out this essay on white privilege and how it affects the daily lives of white people. Reading an essay on what womanism is and why white women can’t identify as womanists struck a chord with me. My kneejerk initial thought was, “She’s being racist! I can call myself anything I want to!” Then I remembered how utterly irritating I found it when I saw other people the same thing – the whole “people of color are racist because they want spaces and a culture of their own without being marginalized” thing. My own mother has made that same argument, most recently in reference to the BET Awards. She demanded that I tell her why there wasn’t a WET network. Because I guess having a privately funded TV network that caters to black audiences is a bad thing. And yet you don’t hear the same complaint about networks like Logo that cater to gay audiences or networks like Lifetime that cater to exceptionally stupid female audiences. And it’s not like Whitey is banned from watching or appearing on the network.

And then I read further, and it became quite obvious to me that that exact perception of people of color having their own unique spaces as being racist against white people is just another facet of white privilege. Even though people of color are marginalized in many public areas where discourse takes place (See: second and third wave mainstream feminism), when they try to create areas of their own, there is always going to be a large group of white people who try to appropriate their spaces.

White women identifying as womanist is just another aspect of that. (For similar reasons, I also disagree with men calling themselves feminists. )

I apologize if this is a little rambly and confusing. Part of the reason I started this blog was for me to have a chance to work out just what exactly it is that I think about, and I get frustrated real quick if I have to explain everything that I’m talking about. But I suggest you give those two things I linked up there a good read, cause they’re really worth it.

I have struggled with self-esteem issues since at least 5th grade when I started puberty. I have never been particularly skinny, and my mother had a habit of buying me very ugly, poorly-fitting clothes. A great deal of my low self-esteem is because of the whole mean-girls-in-middle-school-were-omg-so-meen-to-me, but just as much of it is just in my own head. It doesn’t matter what I wear, if I’m having a good hair day, or if someone tells me I’m beautiful. I just assume that I look like shit or that anyone who is nice to me is lying to me. Obviously that’s something I need to work on.

So, what’s Day 1 all about?

August 1st – Lets start this all of with a simple exercise that has been suggested on this blog before; write a list of at least five things about yourself that you love and tuck that list away somewhere for the next time you’re feeling down. I tend to make a new list/add to an old one every week or so – its a really quick & easy self-esteem boost.

1. I have beautiful hair and eyes.
2. I have a really great sense of humor. I can make most people laugh, and I almost always have something witty to say. I can usually laugh at myself.
3. I am driven and ambitious. Although I am frequently terrified of making nothing of my life and ending up a gas station attendant, I know that there’s no way that could happen because I am just too damn stubborn to get that close.
4. I have the talent to back my ambition up.
5. I don’t take people’s shit, even if I love them very dearly. I’ve lost a lot of friends because of that, but those people weren’t worth being friends with, anyway.

Tune in tomorrow to see the Day 2 update!

Shortbread is one of my favorite things to make. It just has such a pleasing, buttery texture – which makes sense since most of the time the dough is 70% – 80% butter. Plus, it’s fun to make! Most classic shortbread recipes come together so easily that you can just pop it all in a food processor and take out a giant ball of dough. Few things are as exciting to a baker. That’s what I do when I make apple tarts; just a simple shortbread crust that browns really nicely. Shortbread cookies on the other hand, almost never brown for me. They always come out really pale on top but perfectly browned on the bottom. They’re still delicious though, and if you happen to have cranberries and white chocolate then there’s no better way to use em up. Recipe is behind the cut.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 4 cups flour
• 1 (6 ounce) package BAKER’S Premium White Baking Chocolate, chopped
• 1 1/2 cups dried cranberries

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Beat butter and sugar in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add flour; mix well.
2. Stir in chopped chocolate and cranberries. Drop rounded tablespoons of dough, 2 inches apart, onto ungreased baking sheets. Flatten each ball of dough slightly.
3. Bake 10 to 14 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool 5 minutes on baking sheets. Remove to wire racks; cool completely.

Recipe from http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Cranberry-White-Chocolate-Shortbread/Detail.aspx

101 Cookbooks: As you might have guessed, this one is a cooking site. The woman who owns it, Heidi Swanson, created it originally when she realised what an absurd amount of cookbooks she had and how she never used any of them. So she created a food blog to post recipes from said cookbooks, along with her own occasional original recipes. Over time, it’s gradually morphed into containing almost solely original recipes, but that’s nothing to be ashamed of. Heidi is an amazing, creative home cook who makes cooking delicious, high-quality, interesting food not so scary. She uses a lot of  really fresh ingredients, so this site is best used if you visit a farmer’s market often. And really, you should. Farmer’s markets are great sources for ingredients, and having high quality ingredients are the most important thing in making delicious food.

Etsy: This is a really fantastic site. If you hate big business consumerism that abuses human rights and promotes an anti-individualistic form of style that profits mainly old white men but you still crave pretty outfits (LIKE ME!), check this site out. It has all sorts of wonderful homemade and vintage clothing, jewelry, furniture, accessories, dolls…it’s insane how much stuff they have. Most of the vendors are women as well, so if you want to support small businesses run by women, then this is the place to be. Plus, Etsy is HUGE. You can find damn near anything, and for really reasonable prices too. Also they have necklaces shaped like vulvas. I really can’t help that I find that so awesome.

Feministing: THE place to go to get your feminist news fix. Updates daily (and throughout the day!). The editor-in-chief, Jessica Valenti, has written 4 really awesome books on feminism, and they have a huge community. The community is prone to flame wars, so lurking is a good plan. But I cannot stress how amazing this site is. Seriously, if you consider yourself a feminist, then this site needs to be on your bookmarks.

Politics, Technology, and Language: Not updated very often, but a very intelligent blog. The two people who run it are amazing at tearing apart bullshit rhetoric in the media. They also have the full text to a must-read essay by George Orwell, aka the author of Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, entitled Politics and the English Language. If you’re a writer, read that essay. It’s very readable and very useful.

Scarleteen: Sex education in America is bullshit. Straight up bullshit. So much of sexuality is not taught in our schools, which leads to gross and unhealthy things like douching with soda and having vaginal sex right after anal sex. Scarleteen is a fantastic resource for all your sexual questions, no matter how dumb you think think they are. No matter what your level of sexual experience is, you could still probably learn something by checking them out.

Skillet Doux: The name is all kinds of stupid, but I love this food blog. Dom does Top Chef Power Rankings whenever there’s a new Top Chef season (my favorite show!), not to mention how much he travels. He reviews a lot of restaurants and posts recipes of his own creation on occasion. His Five-Spice Rubbed Pork Chops with Mint-Cherry Vinaigrette and Gingered Parsnip Puree is my mother’s favorite food.

The Curvature: I can’t really explain why I love The Curvature so much, but I just do. This is a feminist blog, and Cara is a no-holds-barred kinda chick. She wrote a series of essays on why Yoko Ono is demonized in music history which is one of my very favorite pieces of feminist writing. All in all, a cool chick.

The Joy of Baking: Oh MAN this site is the best. If I ever want to bake something new, I check out Joy of Baking and look for a recipe, because it doesn’t matter what recipe I pick – they are all extremely high quality. A year or so ago, when I created The Freaking Sweet Chair for a silent auction, all of the baked goods on the chair were made using recipes from Joy of Baking. In addition to recipes, there’s also quite a few essays on the history of each of the pastries and techniques for making your cookie the best it can be.

We Love Colors: My friend Superbitch introduced me to this site only recently, but I fell in love with it very quickly. You see, I love colors. And they love colors. IT’S A MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN. But yeah, We Love Colors sells primarily tights, but also leotards and other dancewear. The colors of their tights are extremely varied and vibrant. They also have some really gorgeous ‘splash’ color combo tights, which are essentially tie-dye. But what I really love about this site is how almost everything they sell also comes in plus-size. I am a size 16, and I really appreciate that there is a business that sells bright and colorful tights in plus-sizes. Fat girls love color too. I recently bought a pair of amethyst-and-black striped tights and a pair of splash color knee highs. They are probably the best tights I’ve ever owned.

So yeah! Blog post #3 is finished. Now I’m going to try to hold myself back from making another post until at least tomorrow. Toodles.

Feminism is a dirty word now in public opinion. When someone says “feminist”, what do you think of? Hairy armpits, misandry, women ruling the world and keeping men underground for breeding purposes, things of that nature, probably. Certainly there are feminists who fit that belief system. But there are also Republicans who believe segregation and eugenics are awesome. Certainly not all Republicans are like that. Not even most of them.

Feminism, at its innermost core, is a social movement dedicated to bringing about equality of the sexes. Most people in this day and age would probably agree with equality. What’s not to like about equality? Thing is, although women can vote and go to work, and there have been enormous strides in women’s rights, women aren’t equal.

Why aren’t women equal? Well, let’s start with the most obvious and tangible example: the wage gap. On average, women make 76% of what men make. In 1963, when the Equal Pay Act was signed, women made 60% of what men made. Progress? Sure, if you call 16% in 46 years progress. (From US Census Bureau of Labor Statistics) Women are hardly ever in high-ranking corporate positions, particularly not women of color.  There’s a lot of bullshit about women “opting out” of the workforce to take care of kids – but this argument comes from just one article that appeared in the New York Times in 2003, which focused only on a small group of rich white women who had the option to not work. Hardly a social trend. Many women, especially women that live in poverty (and fun fact, women are also 40% more likely to live in poverty than men) have no choice but to work. My own parents have both worked since I was a baby, because they could never afford for my mother to just stay home. I don’t mean to clutter up my argument with anecdotal evidence, but this is an article on why I am a feminist. So yeah, Reason #1.

Reason #2: Although male morality relies on traits like bravery, honesty, dignity, and integrity, women’s morality is frequently reduced to what lies between her legs. To society, it doesn’t matter if a woman is a good person or not if she has a lot of casual sex. Only Naughty Girls have sex! But if you don’t have sex, then you’re a frigid prude. Women constantly are made to balance the delicate line between being a Madonna and a Whore. Just look at Britney Spears’ early career. She proclaimed herself to be waiting for marriage, but put out songs and videos that promoted her as being an extremely hypersexual person. And don’t tell me I’m A Slave 4 U isn’t saying that. Even though there is no medical definition of virginity and whether or not you have sex has literally no effect on whether or not you are a good person, women are almost always reduced to their sexual availabilty. Most people are familiar with the double-standard of men being able to fuck whoever they like while women are skanks if they jill off once in awhile. I am not down with that. I refuse to let anyone make what I do with my clit their business unless we are currently fucking. And as long as I’m not hurting anybody, who I fuck has no relation to whether or not I’m a good person.

And finally, we come to Reason #3: Rape apologism. If you aren’t already familiar with feminism, this’ll probably seem odd to you. Rape is obviously a serious crime, why the hell would anyone try to make it seem less serious than it is? Well, because of the popular perception of what a rapist is. A rapist in the public consciousness is always male. He hides in the bushes and waits to ambush young women walking home alone late at night.  But this is a very, very narrow definition of a rapist. A rapist is one who rapes or has raped. That’s it. What is rape? It is very important that we understand what rape is before we can understand rape apologism.

WARNING! THE FOLLOWING SECTION MAY BE TRIGGERING FOR SOME PEOPLE!

Rape is any unwanted sexual contact. It can be penetration with a penis, fingers, or another foreign object. It can be forcing someone to perform oral sex. It can be dry humping a passed out girl at a frat party. It can be when two people are having consensual sex and one person wants to stop, but the other person continues. It can be pressuring and coercing someone to have sex with you until they break down and allow it. To make things simple – it is any sexual activity where someone does not say “yes”. How can you keep from raping someone? Just ask your partner if they want to have sex. If they say yes, then you can have sex with them. That is consent. Nothing else. If they say no, then that’s it. Drop the subject. Begging and pleading someone to have sex with you is not consent.

But in our society, we are taught that ‘consent’ is anything that isn’t a no. Having sex with your girlfriend even after she says she wants to stop? Not rape. Nagging and pleading for someone to suck you off until they do? Not rape. Drugging a woman’s drink and forcing yourself on her in the bathroom of the bar? Not rape!

This is fucking BULLSHIT.

And this is where rape apologism comes into the picture. Think back on high-profile rape cases like the Duke lacrosse players scandal, where the victim was demonized in the media as a lying whore who only wanted money. Women who are raped are routinely blamed for their own rapes, or accused of lying. Often, people will even say that a woman (particularly a woman considered by society to be ugly) should take it as a compliment. Why does this happen? Because people don’t want to blame Nice Young Men for rape, even though rape is absolutely the fault of the rapist. I hear frequently people who talk about not wanting a man’s life ruined because of the victim’s rape charges. But what about the woman who has been raped? Hasn’t the rapist ruined her life?

Rape is a serious fucking crime that takes away a woman’s autonomy.

I might sound pretty angry here. That’s because I fucking am. It sickens me that I know so many women who have been raped or sexually assaulted in some way. It makes me want to scream how it’s affected their whole fucking life. It’s not something to joke about, and it’s not something to make light of. And I cannot stress this hard enough – RAPE IS THE FAULT OF THE RAPIST. It is not the fault of the person who was raped. And the only way rape can be prevented is for men to understand what rape is and how they can prevent it. That’s the only way it’s going to stop.

For the record, because I know that statement will turn a lot of men against me, I do not automatically assume that all men are rapists. Most men aren’t. But our entire culture raises men to believe that women’s bodies are there for them, and that they can do whatever they need to do to get off. Not. Fucking. Okay.

And for the record: anyone can be raped. Anyone. White women, women of color, men, transgender women, transgender men, old people, children, rich people, poor people, prostitutes, professional atheletes, your wife, your husband, your sister, your cousin, your uncle, your best friend of 13 1/2 years. Anyone can be raped. And anyone can rape.

That is why I am a feminist. I refuse to allow this to go on.

If I am ever raped, I will ruin that fucker’s life. I will destroy him in every single way I know how. And I will tell people about it.

I will hand out posters with his picture, name, address, phone number, and least favorite flavor of ice cream.

I will press criminal charges. I will bring forward a civil case. I will key his car.

I will tell everyone he knows about it. I will tell my family and I will not let anyone blame me for what he did. I will talk loudly and repeatedly about it until everyone is sick of me for not being able to shut the fuck up about being raped.

I will let others know that even if someone has torn them up in the same way, that they don’t have to blame themselves anymore. That they don’t have to live in fear that someone will bring it up or that their rapist will come back.

I will be a goddamn feminist superhero.

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Resources/Recommended Reading For A Beginning Feminist:
Full Frontal Feminism – Jessica Valenti
The Purity Myth – Jessica Valenti
Cunt – Inga Muscio