These are real things in the world.
Recently I’ve been finding more stuff on the internet where I think I’d quite like to share that.
First off is a funny one, and possibly an April’s fool given the date it was put up but it’s the Episcopal Church, which is pretty ‘anything goes’ so who knows? (This church has ordained women and gay people in the States for instance). Basically, Barbie has been ordained people. That’s right! It was the pictures I noticed, thought it was quite amusing. Thanks go to Religion News Service for that one.
Since I started using Google Reader I’ve been keeping up with a few feminism blogs. Feminism seems to be a controversial topic (even just amongst friends), as in whether it is a valid viewpoint and whether it is the right viewpoint. Well, I think that while women still earn less on average than men, take on the bulk of the childcare, and abortion remains a taboo that you can’t generally talk about from a personal level and , then yes, feminism is still relevant. While 2 women every week are killed by their partner or former partner, 1 in 4 women will experience domestic abuse and the rape conviction rate remains stupidly low, and women are still often made to think it’s their fault, then yes, feminism is still relevant. And that’s just in the UK, never mind how bad it can be for women abroad. This may not surprise you, but I’m a feminist.
Anyway, I think it was through one of the feminist blogs that I came across the ‘ladies against feminism’, a group of mostly conservative home schooled Christians who are promoting being a woman, i.e being feminine, a homemaker, subordinate to your husband etc. In this particular blog, which is kind of long, I got a bit riled because she actually put ‘Women are not designed to be independent or unprotected.’, and criticised those who teach women to be independent because it will bring emotional baggage into a marriage. *thump, thump, thump* sorry, that’s my head against the table. I’m a feminist for the world, because I think that any woman, anywhere, should be allowed and able to live an independent life as she chooses if that is what she so wishes. It’s not rocket science. The whole thing often quotes bible passages, and she is basically stating her reasons for staying at home while going to college, which seems to be entirely religious and anti-feminism reasons. This struck me as odd anyway, because I know plenty people in the UK stay at home for university, generally for practical financial reasons, they were just attached to home, or the local university is world class anyway, why bother going elsewhere?
As a slight point, I think you can definately be feminine and a feminist, but this means you do get into an argument about what feminine is, because it is a social construct. I’ve got one friend who actually doesn’t like to define their gender, because that doesn’t make them who they are. They are female, but that’s their sex, not gender. She firmly believes she would be the same person were she a man. I’m not entirely sure about that one, but it’s certainly an intriguing concept.
People are ignorant about contraception. This is not a revelation to me, I’m not convinced I could say what all 11 types of female contraception are off the top of my head. Yes, that’s right, 11! For men, there are only 2, condoms and the snip. This article, which I think I stumbled upon, shows how men don’t understand their girlfriends contraception. Y’know, I don’t think this is the world’s biggest issue as the girls seem to have their heads screwed on and are using their contraception properly, who cares if the partner doesn’t understand how it works, as long as it does. But still, it might be quite nice if people knew about all the different kinds, and roughly how it works (especially that 2 condoms together will only make the situation worse, not better). Even just with the different kinds of condoms. People constantly pick the same blue ones at work and I keep wanting to say, the yellow ones are the same, or for them to try the black one that says ‘extra’, which isn’t actually larger, it has extra lube, which might be quite nice, I don’t know because I haven’t tried it. Also, I can honestly say that taking the pill has actually liberated me. All this has been giving me ideas for the future, and this time next week there will be at least one thing determined regarding my future, but I can’t actually say anything about it here just now. Those of you who know me will know what I’m on about, and if you don’t then I’ll try and remember to write something here about it, so that sentence doesn’t remain a mystery.
Anyway, this got long and serious, sorry about that. I have head off cause I have a lot to get sorted for next week, which I’m getting incredibly excited and a bit nervous about. Toodle pip!
