Just Clearing things up a bit and announcements.

I have been doing this for nearly two years it is a habit so i often must write before i sleep to get ideas out of my head.

So i am awful now on comments and such and getting back ( Side note" Joan if i don't email you by sunday poke me with a sharp stick)

its been a week

I'm finishing of the teaching of the babies

Moving the wife.

Doing the new job

Needing the pay from the new job

( I finally have steady income AND HEALTHCARE and benefits just may not see them before January)

Dealing with the physical rigors of the new jobs

Remembering my second language in a rush of needing to use it AT HIGH SPEEDS

AT realizing oh shit im still somewhat finishing of puberty

But some things

Ilyka rocks

mor etomorrow
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I Struggle Everyday

Today ( well officially yesterday ) is not a good day.

It's not bad day by any means but it's a day and my mind is flowing freely. TOnight I must write myself to sleep

For the first time in 11 years I am coming t o the end of teaching. I will not be lesson palnning trying to educate or enliven after the middle of this month.

I just can't .

I am starting to feel itchy in my own skin as a teacher, as a person

And I can't teach kids that way

And today i Had a day that just

I teach and i do writing exercises while in there.

It is PAINFUL to get " good kids" to write.

They want your approval , they want your assurance.

They want you to show them they are " smarter than everyone else.

SO i had an exercise where I said write what you need to tell people don't worry a bout cursing don't worry about anything write free.

ANd I used it to have a productive writing exercise and teaching moment with a student. But cause Ms. Amazon is a FUCKING NINNY.

I left the paper.

another student found it and turned it in (yes turned it in)

and they had a meeting

and made other students verify her

and did not call me.

And someone took me aside and said

" i get what your doing" but it puts us in bad place so could you not have em curse"

I apologized for losing the paper. I apologized for the stress, but I wouldn't apologize for letting a child

SPEAK HER MIND.

I want to say i was amazonian and angry with it but i Was stuttery

and confused.

AND PISSED

Cause I had an apology I Need to make.

To the child

IN PUBLIC.

And that's where I think my heart breaks.

This child amuses me. She is ghetto as all get out, she doesn't do soft.

So i pull myself down to eye level.

" That should have never happened to you I apologize"

She was somewhat confused. She's fine and whatever no biggie

It happens all the time.

WHAT?!

I betrayed her trust by losing this paper she got grilled and she seemed a little perplexed I would INSIST on saying I was sorry.

and it hit me like a shit ton of bricks.

She was used to it

This was how she was treated.

I also flashed back to why the person stepped back from me. My words were saying " I apologize" my face was saying OH HOLY FUCK I DID THAT TO THIS GIRL"

and it wasn't a big deal to them.

She wasn't gonna be disciplined so why would i seem so fierce over her being questioned, over them not just checking WITH ME and believing that this child was worth " bothering the teacher"

It's just these are the things that haunt my dreams when we talk about women, of the low expectations on others we foster in girls, in this deference to a witch hunt and being chastized.

That a child would be shocked an adult take a promise made to her seriously enough to be sorry.

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AAminah at Writeous Sister speaks has a magnificent piece of writing up about why she is not a feminist.

I tis magnificent because it is honest and true and real and sharp

but it hurts me and things in the comments hurt me,

They hurt me regardless of her intent , and they hurt me because they deny me and the deny my journey and my being.

Not the things she says about herself which is her truth but the things she says about we and what we need .

I do not endeavor to change the way she feels about her writing and her life but I must frankly so i can come to some peace

SPEAK.

To her , to you

but mostly to myself. i bring these things here because they are things i want to work out and do not wish to clutter her thread with my own musings but want to let it be known what i am coming form.

4. Why I despise the feminist movement and do not care to be a part of it.

a. I am tired of women of color being pitted against men of color because of this mis-notion that allegiance to other women is all that matters.

b. I do not need to make the movement mine. It’s not mine, it never will be mine. I have my own movement that is in line with my Islamic beliefs and values. Western style feminism, by any name it is called, is a secular order that seeks to wipe out my spirituality and force me to selfishly over-emphasize women to the detriment of others.

c. I do not feel the need to make myself a part of something where I am not wanted. It is my personal belief that women of color trying to stuff ourselves into the feminist movement does us an injustice. We do not need to broaden the acceptance of our experience into formal feminist theory. We do not need to make feminism “our own”. We can create our own revolutions, not jump on the bandwagon of that of another and then cry when we are pushed off.

d. I am not academic, have never “studied” feminist theory and do not even care to know most of the ridiculous terminology and theories that abound. I know my reality as a poor, Muslim, Native American woman in the U.S.A. I don’t need fancy theories to explain it. I don’t need my experiences to be supported by the experiences of others or to be validated by academia.

God that hurt and it made me angry.

Angry because of how i came to feminism what i believe it to be and most importantly to me my ancestors my foremothers and family.

a)I am not pitted against anyone, nor did the women who brought me to this work do any such thing. I cma here through Ida B Wells and Fannie Lou Hamer. Ida who was a woman black by herself doing massive studies no one else was undertaking, organizing, whose methodolgies uncredited are STILL used whose grassroots methods still show up.

Around the lynchings or black men. When the NAACP had to be pushed she did the pushing. When there was a place that was a vacuum , it was she and other organizing around the strength of their belief in the ability of women , who aided their men.

When Fannie Lou Hamer was beaten for organizng sharecroppers and taking baton hits like raindrops, it was for the men and the women and the children, when she told democratic conferences, and creditors, and doctors NO you will not do this unacknowledged it was for the men and women and childre,

They considered themselves feminists,these women helped me stay alive, their thinking was based around love and engagement for all of their community.

And it was long before any of these white women were around, so why should I cede this to them. And to say that this power was not ROOTED in the LOVE of men and their communities is simply untrue.

b) is your belief and I can not and will not argue otherwise.

c)But this this hurt me deeply. I am not talking when I talk of my belief in feminism of broadening theory. I am not making anything new my own. When the Seneca Falls convention is based on the governances of native women, when the Women's movement is based off of the organization strategies of female Black abolitionists, and female civil rights leaders, when the very abortion rights are based off the mutilation and extermination of slave women.

These are my stories, this is no bandwagon, this is no crying about being pushed of and frankly it's deeply hurting and dismissive to characterize it as such. My folks dies for this, my grandmothers, took hell for their right to raise families, to HAVE families, these ARE my movements . And fighting that the people who I loved that made them get proper recognition, is not crying when we get pushed off , it is justice.

I will not give them feminism , because it is not theirs. That is not debatable to me . I respect your not claiming , i understand but it is not theirs. IT is not something they made and i joined, it is like most things something we made and have kept in small spaces and fought for in large ones. I will not be disappeared from it and making sure that my people are honored correctly prevents me from doing nothing, and simply means i spread truth.

d) I am poor Blackand while academic , have never studied "feminist theory" and i am hurt by you calling the work of these women fancy theories. These women did not join academia to exclude anyone. Their work that I fight for in being RIGHTLY recognized is not about some need for validation by ivory tower academics or academia. I do not need the back up , but I will accept nothing less than their proper due.


And when you say thanks for not taking it personal, I am not sure who that is directed at but no.


Whatever you feel about it, for some women this is their work. You have every right to reject it and they have the right and space to feel hurt

And that is whether you intend to or not saying there is a right way to receive this.

As if feeling hurt by these things means automatically they aren't willing to work together.

IF we are to grapple this together and I hope you would continue to be willing with me and as PEOPLE not as feminists or non feminists, to say that is

whether you intend to or not

and whether you disclaim it or not

instructing us what is the wrong and right human emotion and proper reception.

As you chafe against that and find it hurtful, so do we .

And no it's not about rejecting feminism, it's about framing the work WHETHER you agree with it or not in such a way that renders us invisible, and misguided because we aren't giving the " proper" answer

IN love and what for me may be a restles slseep

BLackamazon
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So just so you know

SYLVIA's A G

Dear It's a pleasure to be here

You se ethat link to the side thats my email adress and my blogger profile which incidentally are not hard to find.

Also

Maybe if your simple fucking ass would read where I say I AM NOT an emblem for WOC you'd have leg to stand on but hey god forbid we read.



Question to all,

SO after I get called dumb, or told my self definition is an unfair criticism ( I believe I am #4 " the Emblem of Young WOC Feminist Anger with the potty mouth" or allowed to be thrown under a bus in front of my face or told I'm unreadable


Why is the conciliatory solution

ALWAYS

WITHOUT FAIL

TO ASK ME TO BRING THAT STUPID UNWARRANTED SACRAFICABLE EXPENDABLE RHETORIC

to do unpaid copy editing, consulting and or curriculum building.

Why come when people want to build bridges I end being asked to do more work?
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Something Else to Be {To Be Re(a)d}

This Day did not start out well for my feelings with this blog.

People are checking my archives (*waves at people* )

HARD.

There is something rather odd about having a high hit count on a holiday it makes you paranoid.

But then I went to the library and read the some things and brain food makes me happy and then and then LEX made me overjoyed

She said i could turn in the world's latest assignment.

SO let's talk about Re(a)d

Warning the below post will be NC-17, WOC centered and just about every thing else that seems to make folks not have any idea how to treat an idea with a respect.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“having long ago realized they were neither white nor male…they went about creating something else to be.”

In this amazing course piece lex talks about Sula's role in the genesis of Black Feminist Literary Theory.

The above quote struck me hard.

I have read Sula about four times, and that quote didn't jump until I read that post by lex.

The idea of two colored girls creating something new to be, because the choices were white or female.

Which made me think heavily because historically , neither of those concepts were created without the body somewhere of a "colored girl".

If we talk about Feminism , we MUST talk about Seneca Falls which As BFP points out was based on the freedoms white women experienced and relayed back in NATIVE COMMUNITIES.

IF we talk about Victorian sexuality, hell Hottentot Venus, Arabian Odalesque, Slave girl, and mystic Asian woman.

While white women chaffe at these roles, or use them as ways to emphasize the need for their ascension into power structures etc etc

WE HAD TO TAKE THEM ON PAIN OF DEATH OR SEVERE CONSEQUENCES.

But Fuck it this is about me and Sylvia and I'm guessing most of you.

We get to be girls together.

One of the many numerous things that happens while I'm upset is I call my wife.

When I first got body rocked by this I called her.

She says when I'm sad I sound all of five years old.

I never was a little girl for long.

That's what happens when your brown, and grow boobs early , even if you don't have hips or your real ass until your 23

You see as little girls of color we don't get to be girls .

Yesterday was the first day of 16 days against sexual violence.

And while i am not physically assaulted , I know what's it's like to be grabbed , smacked , followed stalked

I knew that by 10.

Not a little girl

Sula ( and until a certain point Nel) do something amazing in the novel.

They will themselves into an entirely new existence.

While the phrase it as not being white or male , their is also this tacit unsaid rejection of we also will not be the things people expect of us for NOT being that.

To me it harkens back to Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. " A black woman is da mule oh da world"

They choose and Sula continues to choose not to be that.

Not to be the women in their community afraid of moist , to be the woman who fucks who she wants, who assumes her right to be what she wants

Sylvia and the rest of you but mostly Sylvia .

We get to be girls together.

I thik why i got real full out mad , and I claim it by the time Samhita got to Sylvia's old blog I was about to call everybody and they kinfolk some things that still curdle my OWN ears

was me and SYlvia

are a lot a like .

We're black girls, and yes I am NOW 23 so if you can do math when i was getting my ass rocked I was 22 and Sylvia was 21.

How many black girls you know graduate at 20 and write her prose, how many black girls you know get the world the way she does, lives the life she does , deals with her shit, writes amazing legal theory

AT TWENTY

How many?

You know what it's like to be a black girl genius?

You know what it's like to be a black girl in a hard family?

I do.

And on our blogs we created we got to be girls together.

And we were getting DONE IN

for daring to create a space where we could speak and be as black girls.

Something little white girls rarely think TWICE about.

We don't get books telling us t hat our foibles and mishaps won't lead to devastating consequences, we get the " SHUT YOUR DAMN LEGS".

We don't get the your life is worthy even as every single confessional in a women's studies class is honored. We get pitted against each other to prove somebody else's point with our blood.

We don't get to say I am woman hear me roar" . We say I am woman , dear god I Hope you find my sister today"

This exploration this imagination that is assured white girls DOESN'T happen for us.

But we were making it in with our fingers , our words, we had carved out little spaces to be girls.

to like boys, to wonder, to make our words matter

and now ( and agin it's being tried) people tried to RIP that from us so that we could assure someone else's girl(s) that if it was okay to them

We'd be sacrificed again and it wouldn't ride their conscious.

Not for my Sylvia.

We get to be girls together.

We get it if we have to make it.

And for those of you who don't understand.

Take two twenty year olds, pushed by police violence,sexual violence, make them smart, unbelievably so, make them honest and caring, make them beautiful.

Make them willing to try .

Make them care about the world

Make them willing to show you their growth.

What do you give them, how od show them the world , how do you help them grow?

What words do you give them.

How do you handle them showing preternatural intelligence.

What color were they?

DO they get to be girls?

Well then,

SO DO WE.
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I really tried.

iT is going to take everything I have for me not to curse.

And I am going to fail. cause really I'm calling people out and being done with this madness cause it's AMAZING

* DEEP BREATH*

Now I know it is hard for some people to understand but I never have presented my self as a spokeswoman for Women of Color

or Young Women

or Poor Women

or Young Child Prodigy's of Color.

I am an ass arrogant " i believe it and that's good enough for me" Leo when it comes to my opinions. ( there goes the me not cussing)

So it amuses me well actually now it doesn't amuse me it fucking frightens me when I go through my statcounter to find myself being referenced as such .

So really I am annoyed that SIX FUCKING MONTHS LATER I HAVE TO COME BACK TO THIS SHIT.

FFF

Aka. the book that made me cry till I vomited

aka. The book that earned me the feeling of the world's largest zoo fucking animal

NO REALLY

First what amuses me is that magically and I do mean magically considering the fact that there WERE MANY OTEHR CRITIQUES OF THE BOOK BY MEN AND WOMEN.

Somehow the only ones folks remember are the WOC ones, which are jsut not fair cause she WROTE ABOUT IT! SO STOP BEING MEAN!

Mind you and I invite you I REALLY DO

to go back and examine the WOC critiques of teh book , not the cover but the fucking book.

the most pinged about ones were


MINE AND SYLVIAS.

WOMEN OF COLOR ?

THAT'S TWO.

ALMOST EVERY OTHER WOMAN OF COLOR ( and mind you that includes cornsilk petit, Ren EV, Octagalore, belledame, ilyka, etc who magically BECAME WOMEN OF COLOR) CRITIQUED LARGER DYNAMICS OF FEMINISM.

LET ME SAY THAT ONE MO GAIN!

BFP,DONNA,FABI, FOR CHRIST SAKE EVEN NUBIAN WHO DOESN'T BLOG ANYMORE


WERE NOT CRITIQUING THE BOOK

THAT WAS ME !

AND SYLVIA.

AND MOST OF THE CUSSING WAS ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

so you can imagine my fucking shock when it gets proliferated around the internet that WOMEN OF COLOR have issues with it.

Now why wouldn't i be happy at being elected a voice of WOC ?

doesn't everyone want that power.

NO

If a group of YWOC want to say what i speak resonates with them fine , but I will not accept someone else trying to put me there.

Why?

CAUSE THEN YOU GET THE EXTRA SPECIAL SHIT LIKE THIS!

Because suddenly the whiteness critiques aren't specific or grounded but sarcastically quotation ed. And by being located out into some imagined ether rather than the words of specific individuals ( this time me but in other contexts other women) they can be manipulated and responded to anonymously without ACTUAL INTERACTION by the presented views instead only presented by the suddenly impartial proxy.

Suddenly their color and his whiteness are assets to challenge these " responses" mind you HE CHOSE ME as typical " criticism"

Notice the passage he chose in his gathering in May WAS A DEFINITION OF MYSELF. YES YOU READ THAT RIGHT. A WHITE MALE said that my self definition was UNWARRANTED CRITICISM.

Now BFP is awesome

and of course points out some of the MANY MANY MANY problems with this post.

AS EMBLEMATIC OF WHAT IS WRONG WITH WOMEN STUDIES.

NOT AS A PROBLEM OF THE BOOK

BUT AS EMBLEMATIC OF THE PROBLEM OF WOMEN'S STUDIES.


YET AND STILL WE MUST RECENTER

onto what he knows about BCMBN.

So a discussion happens on the state of feminism NOW

and the white middle class women get a book published THIS YEAR

and he reads BFP's testimony and crows about reading a book that's THREE YEARS OLDER THAN ME with some of it's contents being 10-15 years OLDER THAN ME?!

OR that a similar discussion about these dynamics centered around the book Gynecology HAPPENED IN 19 fucking 70.

* is frantically and furiously looking for that machete*


But really we'll get to it sometime really.

see here:

I think there’s plenty of time, Jeff, for us to bring up the past shortcomings of white feminists in reaching out to young women of color. But Valenti’s book is radically relevant to their lives right now, irrespective of class and ethnicity. Read in a vacuum, it would be problematic in a women’s studies course — read in conjunction with a variety of other texts, it’s superb.

I mean there is plenty of time I mean these criticisms have only been around since IDA B WELLS FOR FUCKS sake .

WE HAVE ALL THE GOD DAMN TIME IN THE WORLD FOR ANOTHER generation of WOC to go on to meet our foremothers while the white folk get around to it.

so you see I CRITIQUED A FUCKING BOOK

and because folks decided I was suddenly the WOMAN OF COLOR it became okay to dismiss discount and ERASE a whole host of other women by rendering me "unreasonable" and then making me THE VOICE.

and i know it's HARD for some of our more power hungry friends to understand but no that's not how it works.

this is why if you read back you'll hear " well the talks came to nothing"

I am gonna say FLAT OUT anyone who says I wouldn't talk to anybody

IS A FUCKING LIAR.

I wouldn't talk to anybody in secret.

I wouldn't and will not talk to anyone around this book or these issues in secret because of the need of the public record.

Because EVEN WITH A PUBLIC RECORD

people are inventing history right the fuck out the damn sky .

It's not like people won't tell me WHAT I AM .

It's not like brilliant intelligent women won't get reduced to THAT MOTHERFUCKING TONE ARGUMENT AGAIN.

or recentered around the concerns of white peoples theoretical musings

or an imaginary CAULDRON OF WOC PICKING ON A NATIONALLY PUBLISHED AUTHOR

THAT WAS THREE YOUNG WOMEN HAVING THE FUCKING NERVE TO HAVE THEIR OWN GODDAMN OPINIONS.

used to

DISMISS VARIOUS INTELLIGENT WOMEN OF COLOR VOICES.

Now let's wait for someone to tell me about my fucking language right now and how that's not conducive for building bridges.
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Small Notes

1) so it's official since people who believe that I need to be discredited at ALL COSTS for the glory of FEMINISM ?!?! Can't even say my name. I will now be referred to as sweetyanceydelicousemphermistutolatottenedge . Cause since BA or BLACKAMAZON is way too fucking simple

2) I am redesigning my tattoo . It's not butch enough for me .

3) Michelle is a rockstar.

4) Petit has joined Kai, BFP, Tom from Automatic Preference, and KAE and my wife as people who just by being NEAR me are magically black women

5) 23 is now not young . It's fully grown adult . However should I express an intellectual opinion that is too difficult to grapple with . I will be pointed to the fact that I would still be in college. Should I express an opinion taht points out the ludicrousness s of someone claiming my experience as a subset of their own. I am old and policing

6) considering my personal w experience with police next perosn who pulls that one. Gets lit the fuck up

7) Sylvia is a rapstar.

8) Reasons to watch grey's anatomy : Eric Dane being insanely hot and joyously developmentally stunted, Chandra Wilson being awesome, and Sara Ramirez being beyond the sexy. Can Sara and Eric's characters get more time together it would make me insanely happy and thank you. Also if the chief wasn't old enough to be my daddy he's be on the hit list. Also Eric Dane with the full gray . Sexy

9) Eric Dane reminds me of an acquaintance who is also made of the damn gorgeous. For the ladies of SR that would be the reason I AM NOT COOL !

10 ) i nee dto write about sex I should to a week long festival.

11) it's amazing to find you have what you need
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Unpacking the Black College Storage

Can I tell you story? My horoscope said to tell a story, cause everyone knows your opinions tell a story.

Here's my story.

* curls into BFP*

I hurt myself .

I looked the wrong way all the time.

When I was 11 I wanted to kill myself.

I had my fake Tommy Hilfiger wearing poor ass pointed out to me.

I wasn't run away smart anymore for my grade which I was still about two years ahead in.

No boys would date me I was fat and ugly.

No grown men would leave me a lone I was young and busty.

I was already hormonal and bleeding.

My mothers call to finding me " discovering my burgeoning sexuality" was to cry and scream and moan about how she failed me if i did " that"

I was black and all the pretty people weren't. I was obsessed with telling people I was mixed so they could see the exotic beauty in me.

Instead it made me a dog.

And I .

I wanted to die.

I was an 11 year old 7th grader and I wanted to die.

I wrote a note in seventh grade science , I told my friend at the time who would grow to be a cutter.

And She called me that night and my mother "overheard" me. Listened in on my call

And there was crying and drama and the end result I couldn't do this to her.

But I could do this to me .

This.

If even wanting to leave wasn't my choice, if my life wasn't my choice except for how it made other people feel

If it was never about me.

Then hurting ME

Was not a problem.

If I didn't hurt the daughter , or the student, or the bright shiny hope of the race.

no big deal.

So if I got into repeated " fights with curling irons" because i rested them against my forehead to see what I could take to get that perfect curl,

If I heated them just to mark my skin

If I barreled through life not noticing the bruises , or the hurt feet , or the emptiness , or the cuts

that came because I wanted to be whatever made someone else happy at any speed.

When I was 17 I was in college.

And when I was 20 I was a graduate

And when I was 23 .

I unpacked the Black College Storage .

I looked at the things I left behind. The Monologue books I loved. The Music Books I loved. The tarot cards I'd been blessed with, my kente cloth and over size flag.

I didn't want to die , but I didn't think that me was worth it.

The bits and pieces of me , that I missed shoved into boxes because I couldn't be those things and a good job prospect , a good worker, a good human, good enough to stop hurting.

Good enough to not be shattered by the world.

It got better in three years, not because of therapy ( i can't afford it) . It didn't get better cause I protested, or spoke truth to power.

It got better because I heard story's and people heard mines.

I heard stories and people made me feel my story was important.

Today I heard a story

of an 11 year old.

Who just wants to be good in school without having to fight off people, everyday.

Today I heard a story of fifth grader who just wants to dress well.

We always look the wrong way hermana.

We tell them they can work this off

We tell them that we think it's not important.

That they will grow out of it.

Grow out of being torn and disvalued.

Grow out of believing that wrong is their name.

That " those people" don't matter.

Fuck it!

Right?

Because brown women can say that to ICE.

Because poor women can say that to WIC or welfare.

Because little brown girls can say that to teachers.

or soldiers.

We look the wrong way.

When we make people we've raised to be broken tell us how to fix themselves to help us sleep at night.

We swear the danger is out there.

The danger the death the believe that dying was better was not coming with the slave catchers but in Sethe's every step.

When you believe the life you will live is worth nothing, the only thing that can save is a story.

A story that tells you it's worth it.

When stories make beautiful 13 year old girls prefer to die.

When stories make 50 year old women think it's okay to make 13 year old girls want to die

When stories are that's left of fading communities.

When stories save 20 year old lives.

When people use any venue any thing to just maybe ensure part of their story will be told.

When I locked away parts of myself to tell what I hoped would be a good story.

When one story has created the world. Why do we believe that stories and words are nothing?
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Let the Holiday season begin.

So Donna sent me this and i read the post

and thought.

I remember her , from the Clinton brouhaha.

Will not engage.

Closed screen

Then I was pointed to the comments.

"Illegals".

the different levels of illegals

Ties to community.

" liberal blog"

Must be Holiday season.

I mean when else do we get this faux compassion from all walks of privilege discourse. Mind you in her eyes the immigration story doesn't deserve even a full fucking post. OR you know honest engagement t o the ATROCITY unfolding IN our country WITH our permission.

She was busy but let's go to her links which she so graciously gives us.

These gifts of how enlightened the left is when it comes to the treatment of " illegal aliens" or " illegals"

These thought's which she links as her thoughts on " immigrants" not on immigration , not on Policy but immigrants.

See the shock on blackamazon's face when the turn into long wistful screeds and supposedly down home wisdom on her life and the function it has on " Americans" and how it make's Bush look bad.

Must be Holiday Season.


While Maha is someone i make no bones about openly and fully disdaining since her treatment of Donna during the Clinton lunch.

What is more frightening is her non uniqueness in these attitudes, and the self congratulation that comes with it.

LOOK HOW BAD THE REPUBLICANS are running the country.

Yes please let's look as you use the innate suffering of a child being ripped form he rmothers arms to make you a political point.

Lets also how not onc ein your constant screed of self deluded l absorption do you call these "illegals people"

Marvel as use it to set up what you consider Is the REALLY heartbreaking story.

Because for real testimonies and witness form the horror s government have created ( mus t of course come from "reputable" big name aka. MSM or powerfilled sources) BFP et al...

Yall just was not important enough.

please note the Bedford Raids, that absolutely appalling story about the young man who was sexually assaulted and DEPORTED for reporting it( a 13 year old being molested by a teacher and transported for that purpose is not being ripped form his Mama, wait a minute he's Mexican don't count), that young woman who got assaulted and abused by her roomates ,

These aren't important because they can't underline THE REAL HONEST EVEN MORE HEARTBREAKING story of MEDICAL INSURANCE WOES!

Never mind that that story is saddening and relevant in and of itself. But of ocurse lets use it to make snide comments at republicans.

Must be holiday season.

I mean in a country that prides itself on its " self determination" and historical pride , that needs damn near four hundred years to figure out that the "savage " Natives had complex intelligent societies that were the only reason the Pilgrims were able to survive and later lead a complete take over of the land, while being abnormally self righteous

and then celebrate it without irony.


I mean part of the reason I ended up abandoning my hopes of nunnery was the God and religion I believed in that i had developed within me looked nothing like the one I was being asked to worship.

Sounds a lot why I stopped being a Democrat.

Because how else can you take a story of the need of people for a savior from continued and selfish oppression. The overarching power of greed and classist, religious oppression, the ability for the mere possibility of kindness and joy and love to bring people across national,racial, and religious boundaries, the magnitude with which people will go to eliminate such an idea and the fact that the idea can STILL SURVIVE in the form of a state unwanted but loved by his family baby?

and have it become a mad rush to buy stuff and consume as much as humanly possible.

I mean there is NO parallel in having the state hunt babies and rip them from their mothers.

There is no jaw dropping insanity in believing you are demonstrating compassion.

To PEOPLE YOU CAN'T EVEN ADDRESS AS HUMAN

while saying it's not as sad as a cancer patient.

and using both to beat up a nebulous party that truly doesn't care for another party that barely pretends to.

And consider yourself an enlightened person.


Must be the holidays
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I heart ren EV

I heart ren ev a lot . SHe need not know why I just do.

ALso I Heart her besides teh reason I don't feel like telling

Because she's the only friend I Have and i do think of her as a friend

who doesn't hear about my crush on slash form Guns and Roses and not give me hell.
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Liberal ain' t liberating, progressive ain't progress

So Well Behaved Women went boom.

Your texts for this long ramble are"

But more importantly the ensuing discussion made me think of a question Belle asked a long time ago , which made me really consider a comment by Octa , which led me to think about this comment by BFP and ANOTHER comment by Octa , and a post on bell hooks many many moons ago on Feministe, (thanks for the heads up sylvia, the link one it's a five parter)and also on my year in blogging and my age and etcetera

What Really set my brain to thinking is the comments's made by Octo:

A feminism that demands that women don't climb, or seeks to shame those who do, is a feminism that condones the status quo power gap between men and women.

And BFP:

When your feminist action consists of fighting for the right to BE A PART OF A STRUCTURE that has endorsed and supported and legally allowed the rapes of brown women since the STRUCTURE'S inception--when the STRUCTURE you fight to be a part of WAS BUILT ON THE BODILY DESTRUCTION OF BROWN WOMEN and CONTINUES to legally sanction violence (sexual and otherwise) against brown women, YOU ARE PARTICIPATING IN THE FEMINIST ACTION of VIOLATING brown women.

I agree with both of them, at the same time . And my pretty brown head hurt for a GOOD minute.

Then thankfully from the mists of my comments archives came the voice of Belle ( paraphrased)

" What do we want to be if all we're gonna do is parrot MSM"

I owe Belle pastry. Cause It started to come together.

There is no problem with women lawyers, and engineers and driving women to be the best at what the do .

I am a 23 year old . ( I feel like a damn broken record but it's something I have to remind folks of it. You know how many conversations I get in where people talk to me like I'm a grown ass adult " you should have more experience! You act like your 27 . " I'm 23 so I'm still 4 years ahead )

To be who I am I have HAD to been competitive, hard nosed, and striving.

I have the "goods" why shouldn't I use them. You don't educate and get to here ( whereever here is without being that way).

Not only that but a feminism that would tell young girls that trying not to explore their ability to be the best they can be that feminism regardless of its intentions is a failure.

BUT

Bfp is right the power is not enough.

With that success is REQUIRED action and purpose to destroy the system IN SOME WAY .

You MUST as an ACTIVE part of your "power" seek to dismantle ( not cope with , not redistribute, not change the leadership of) the system .

Be it by affirming the full protection of law, by providing healthcare where the system has purposefully, by actively giving testimony where there is none, with the purpose of changing not just the distribution but the the dynamics .

The amusing,frustrating,glorious , only thing that keeps me from despair , function of this is that, this system which has focused so extensively in SO MANY WAYS on subjugating us is FULL of stress points and places where you can work to destroy the systems of oppression.

BUT

That is NOT

NOT

possible if the " collaboration"

is INVESTED in maintaining an insider outsider dichotomy ie if people's interest become grounded in getting power so they can " make the agenda".

Collaboration and process are dynamic

AND

INTENTIONAL .

You can NOT trip into this one.

I think what most gets me about the " don't worry/let's diversify/we are a big tent "philosophies.

IS the sheer historical and personal arrogance.

The problems and issues people have expressed with " liberal" ideologies , is this belief that cause we've made enough people happy it's ok. Or more scarily that whatever framework they have created ,

Created in white supremacist/hegemonic/ableist/capitalist/heterosexist/homophobic/jingoistic/violent /environment destroying/sex phobic

in times they admit were NOT integrated, or cognizant of these dilemmas.

Is completely and utterly sound for those of us who did not participate in their creation to

ADD ON TO??!

Basically the foundation is rotten but let's add a penthouse. Trust us ! the ones who made the house tilt

So belle what does this have to do with media.

I truly TRULY believe that " new media" ( I just used that phrase i am ashamed for myself) has the ABILITY to truly force open dialogue.

but

I never thought the emphasis would be on force instead of open.

The link above from Feministe is a prime example. While Jill focuses on the " pop culture analysis " value what struck me is a couple things.

The video itself is 8 parts , handy dandy linked her by miss M/Sylvia .

What caught me was the fact that bell hooks saw pop culture criticism not as a value in and of it self ( though it is one)

But as a tool with which to allow people who were not privileged and entitled, to make the same enlightening discoveries. That their views their contributions

WERE IMPORTANT ENOUGH THAT THEY BE REACHED.

NOT because of the need for "diversification" but for any movement to work and build bases that

CONTINUALLY AND STRATEGICALLY EMPOWER rather than just grasp power.

THE MASSES MUST NOT JUST BE REACHED BUT INVOLVED.

While hooks' Ain't I Woman concentrates on feminism , it is easily extrapolated outward. The simple matter of fact REALITY is that movements that claim to be for the people but have troubles " reaching people"

are often completely out of synch with the people.

And no it's not because as is often supposed, that the people are too scared. But that reaching the people

Complicated things .

and this is why the diversity model

BLOWS.

Because rather than becoming as hooks says enlightened witnesses, we simply remake the consumerist

" Take a taste of this and trust me"

Because when we use theorists, writers, to emphasize what we are not ( racist,transphobic, sexist,sexphobic)

We far more often succeed in AFFIRMING their suspicions.

We tokenize them by regulating their detailed heartfelt experience to companion material rather than CENTRAL dynamic

And now I gots to quote Octo again( where she's agreeing with me but still" :

"How can you include someone you see as a respected equal.

If it really is a multi lateral for all women movement there is no need

to " include" me

I'm there."

Absolutely. This really points up the problem, I think. You should be there, and if you don't find yourself there, you've got the right to make the determination whether or not it's relevant.

"Woc aren't often ENgaged

mostly marveled at"

And this too: YES.

When women of color, trans women ,LGBT women, women with disabilities voice the concern that we

ARE NOT INCLUDED

to tell us we are

is not building bridges.

It's an essential mindfuck. It is telling us that we are wrong

ABOUT OUR OWN REALITIES.

When people snippet us it reaffirms that we are essentially that deep . to be glanced at and then returning to the " BIG "message.

If we are equals , if we are in depth and truly important , then why is the first impulse to marvel at our realities like some thing unseen?

If we are truly been involved since the jump , why is there a resistance to creating a mass out look and witnessing that truly affirms our criticisms.

OR more succinctly,

If this wasn't a continuing and UNADDRESSED flaw

Why did Sojourner say it n the 1800's

bell hooks use it to title a book 2 years older THAN ME.

and still NOT believed in 2007
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Good idea... BAd idea

Good idea - meandering around NY with teh wife

Bad idea-all you can eat sushi
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ooh stuff

So oh_annalouise has a post I think's kind of fabulous. ( and a discussion that is also kind of great).


But here are the random musings of one youngster over here and my problem.


Mandolin says the point of the post was that you could be a feminist and be wrong.

Except why is it that the wideness does not extend to everyone? Why is it that often viewpoints are valued more for their ability to answer critiques than for their content.

That battles withing feminism ARE always ALWAYS center out?


The " we have our racist moments" were all essentially comments on how white women had handled race,rather than POC commentary.

Racist moments?

BUHHHHHHH?!?

How about racist begingings, racist history and racist present. Problems with disability??!?!

WHAT

Disabled bloggers and activists often blog about not being willing to TALK TO PEOPLE anymore the ablism is so rampant.

IN this rush to be a big tent , people's issues are getting minimized.

What to some is example of " this really marvelous discourse or an oft mentioned critique"

are reasons why many many grassroots organizations and new thinkers and young women and young men

CAN'T even be bothered.

Feminism can be " wrong"

and leave women to be killed with no record.

Can feminism not stand unless we go no okay you'll be okay?

And what about those of us that it's okay you'll get it next time doesn't hold for?

I think feminism as I believe ( yep it is about me) is about the fight for the survival and self determination of ALL WOMEN.

So if someone is in the way of that and refuses to engage in the actual work of GETTING OUT OF THE WAY OF THAT.

NOPE

and no it's not policing.

Why is looking at someone who thinks poverty is a footnote and telling them you are HURTING women met with a desperate need to assure THEM their still god enough to be a feminist

but no comparable RUSH to try and find the family there words get to starve a way to eat?

Why must the women being screwed not only work to make it better but work on how she talks to people .

I gues my thing is that if we agree that feminism is about LIFE and the lives of women and is integral and IMPORTANT

then we need to agree its HARD

and messing up will happen and have CONSEQUENCES

and one of those consequences might be you know ACTUAL SUBSTANTIVE questioning

including

HOW THE HELL YOU CALLING YOURSELF FEMINIST?!?!


that we must TRULY grapple with our history and our setups and ADMIT to them

instead of

it's in the past

or maybe it wasn't that bad

(Lets ask Ida B how she felt about what Susan B said about the lynching of black men and black women's work shall we?)

There ARE expectations. There ARE rules.

Mandolin says this :

Western feminism is a part of western society and reflects western biases and privileges; rather than limiting it to the most ideologically pure, I would argue for working within feminism with the intersections of other movements such as anti-racism to lessen or eliminate problematic or evil stances and biases.

so the problem is not that there is a race for idealogical purity

BUT

that the idealogical purity has only been defined by ONE SET. And rather than look around and go well it's important lets diversify ( BA twitches mightily)

address the fact that pretending a benevolent diversity

rather than a dynamic cohesive INCLUSIVE SELF GOVERNING community that hold s some standards.

And if ALL women got a real say or were able to be honored voices

Yeah feminism would look MIGHTY different.

And no you can't be a racist and an acceptable feminist.


Can't do it.
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SYLVIA!

FROM YOUR FELLOW MEMBER OF THE BIG BREASTED BUSINESS BOARD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Well Behaved Women ...................

We all know how that quote ends right.

Rarely make history.

It was part of my early introduction to feminism.

Considering my last post about tone and my general history

you would think I love this quote right?

Nope I hates it. I hates it I do.

And I hate it because of my concern with the " tone" argument.

It came up in one of my teaching moments when I was talking about the power of speaking up for yourself and how an illiterate man's petition helped cement the history of a now displaced community of color.

One of the students who I had fallen a little bit in love with mentioned it .

And to be honest with you I was shocked at my visceral rejection of that quote coming from her.

She was a young girl of color.

In college application process for Ivy League schools.

And my only thought was

NOOOO HONEY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOO!

I really hate that quote,because while it's supposed to be some celebration the power of women who buck convention it is and I am actually quoting myself here ( eep).

"An oft used excused for a woman to believe acting like a sanctimonious unexamined twit is the equivalent of revolutionary action"

And I hate it as a woman of color who spends her time engaging and wrestling with feminism ( wait till you see my year end wrap up).

I also hate it as a young woman with a learning disability, a poor woman and a woman who survived academia.

Because for all those reasons, my ability to be recognized or even SURVIVE has hinged on the acceptableness of my behavior.

To believe that your behavior will change history as we accept it is to have a grounded belief that history will treat you fairly .

If you do the right thing or if you fly in the status quo enough.

Heck it's a damn luxury to believe being non well behaved won't get you KILLED or DEPORTED or ERASED from history.

And that quote to me sums up the utter ignorance and repeated disregard that this concept of " RADICAL RIOT ROAR " feminism , grounds little in the lives of women.

ESPECIALLY those for whom misbehavior is not some cognizant or even attainable option.

Today sex positive,sex worker and WOC blogs are blogging for a woman.

She was trying to survive. For many women of color,trans women,LGBT women, this " good behavior" that is so derided is simply self preservation.

A black mother in a city that is dismantling welfare.

She is being told that a gang rape, an utter violation of her humanity.

Is equatable to " theft of goods"

The person who told her this was a woman.

Who " didn't care what people thought"

Tomorrow as people line up , hopefully to vote this woman so hard out of office her head spins round.

I am struck by the girl who told me that quote.

And why I was so violent against it being used.

I make no bones that I want a better feminism . I also make no bones that feminism as is needs to be prefixed for I even talk to it.

Because when I think of that girl and what we were talking about , i felt like I had to be real with her.

Whenever I hear that quote I think i get a chill up my spine.

It's the "head pat" chill.

You know the one , where someone knows better than you do. And won't even deign to discuss it with you.

The one where you get shunted to the side for some bigger ideal.

And in this case it really does play for me in a strange way

Because the judge is a woman , she a high ranking court official. She's a " woman in power"

and what did her power get us

but her looking another human being in the face and telling her she was " stolen goods"

and justifying it by saying " so me people won't like it but so?"

How is that different from

" rarely making history"

" don't worry dear your a feminist"

" Feminsim is..."


That we are as women supposed to invest and believe in women and a movement that are more invested in unfettered power than actually engaging the problems we have with it.

It leaves me in a strange place.

Because in the end our action is focused on deposing and fighting the woman who " mattered'

Her power her "bad behavior" now becomes paramount.

What about the victim?

Why don't we talk about her motherhood or her blackness and her city taking away her options

Why is she suddenly amorphous woman?

To be discussed not as a specific survivor but emblematic of suddenly larger ills .

Why are the WOC and sex workers the ones who remember this may not be a time to be snide and stick it to somebody.

Why do all of these suddenly blend to me into one large drone of " we'll use you any way we want"

Why is she a one liner in a list or a step to something else.

IS that why I Can't tell a young brown girl to love these messages without fear? Is that why I have to prefix my feminism .

or is it that when I am not well behaved I keep remembering people barely think I'm a woman
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Dear Nadia.

My mom wants to meet you. Because ever since I asked you to give me the right way to say your name I have been singing it around the house

I think about you when you wrote about nationality and how it relates to the silencing of the voices of women of color and the violence imposed on our bodies.

And then also the comments on this thread here.

and I wanted to sit with them .

Cause on my first reading I really didn't appreciate the comments.

And i thought about the time I took my hiatus and how I hoped to reevaluate my critiquing and to be truly critical and not just responsive and focus on my sisters of color

And I said you name they way it should be said

And then

I REALLY DIDN'T FUCKING LIKE IT!

I thought the concentrating on you would make me less volatile but it didn't .

ESPECIALLY because of your position as a blogger and as a WOC and as a WOC blogger part of population that goes often unmentioned by even the most "enlightened" people

and add on the fact I love and adore you

Straight up I'm hot.

What annoyed me about the post is the very very salient point you bring up here:

most people in this world have a national identity that was entirely invented and forced upon them by colonizers. Who drew those lines on the map? Who constructed and named those countries? Uh huh.

And the ensuing replies that are sophomoric and point missing in the most predictable of ways. The boorish proselytizing and the " reasoned" measured responses. It amuses me and by amuses me I mean " makes me wanna holler" in frustration at the fact that testimony from the affected is treated as secondary to reasoned debate. It also amuses me that the constant response to someone pointing out injustice and inequality and subhuman circumstances is the ever so smug

" What do your propose?"

How bout I propose mothers being able to work to feed their babies and get proper utilities and that any structure that prevents that and leads to DEATH destruction and forced displacement is wrong and no frankly I don't give a shit about your semantic argument?

It's not an innocent intellectual exercise , it's a subtle reenforcement of the belief that this is the best possible option and if the people most abused cant come up with a better one then really shouldn't they shut up about it cause there really just making noise .


And I'll leave the special special individual who went but OTHER FOLKS DO IT TOO AND IT'S BEEN DONE SO NAH!

As if injustice is inevitable but the fight against it is not. As if these scenarios he brings about aren't ALSO inevitably challenged the way you challenge this accepted belief in a right to nationality, or as one poster brought up the unseen and unmentioned benefits and protections of this nationality that when denied completely unmoor and hurt Palestinians women ESPECIALLY

And as for the Racialicious thread. I was pretty and uniformly pissed.

While there is a demonstrated concern about the Islamo Facist Week I find more concerning the LACK of analysis of the role media plays in SILENCING the people who would speak out against it.

It's not JUST about the drum beats of war , it is also about the fact that there is even an EXPECTATION that an entire religion produce an answer to this main stream onslaught iusing

THE VERY SAME MEDIA

The very idea that there is nothing challenging the idea, to me , is a farce.

Which is why I Didn't respond there as I couldn't get past it.

The particular need for guidance or the " no easily accessible information" ENFURIATES ME.

Islamo Fascist week is the latest in a LITANY or anti arab anti muslim attacks many of which often lead to the DISAPPEARANCE of people., maybe just maybe it is not among AN ENTIRE RELIGIONS mind to provide information , as *gasp* their may not be a muslim opinion to give.

And the use of the Blackout without an explanation or the discussion at all of how certain protests are started and publicized and treated as if they are gospel activity without any REAL ENGAGEMENT Of the community the propose to support( yes I am bitter about it ask me why later)

being used to criticize a religion for not necessarily addressing what is essentially *same shit different day this time with flyers *

but seriously I was willing to let it go

UNTIL I GOT TO THE TONE THING!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also, just for future reference, I was really angry when I initally read your first response. To me, it came off as very flip and dismissive. These phrases in particular

I understand the intent behind your words a lot better now. But the tone and word choices you used in your first points really turned me off to what you were trying to say.

Trust me, I know that things are easily misinterpreted online, so a quick response can be easily construed other ways.

But considering the views you share are important, I am bringing this to your attention. It is up to you to decide what you want to do with this information but I really feel that people need to tread a bit more lightly with how we speak to each other. And Nadia, obviously, this isn’t just directed at you - it happens a lot, all over the blogosphere. (especially on this blog.)

I’m sure you didn’t intend the words as harshly as I interpreted them. Still, I appreciate when people tell me how I could have improved my message and made it more clear. I hope that you are receptive to the same thing.

And see even a month off and mediation can't make me behave.

Bump that noise how's that for tone. Mind you I have no problem with the author but that .

That was enfuriating to me ESPECIALLY during the week of red. So explaining a concept to her that SHE ADMITS TO KNOWING NOTHING ABOUT and acknowledges as a truth requires you to adjust your tone?!

What message are you trying to spread that I missed. Besides the addressing of a virulent and constant accepted strain of anti arab sentiment? Did I miss something ?

I think the non examination of the factors that lead to the SILENCING of ARAB voices ( which oddly enough are the same factors that allow for wars on arab americans to go un challenged but hey that's just me)

That's not your blog a but it is YOUR LIFE. So instead your a chastised publicly and indelicately for an essential agreement for not " treading lightly" ( plus the insinuation that you were quick and unthinking as i know you YEAH NO)

and here's where I relate it to Silencing.

Even in "liberal circles' we are frequently asked to modulate our tone and subscribe to an accepted mode of communication that we have neither agreed to nor do we support. We are asked to consider intent and word choice for the consumption of others even when they demonstrate little to no concern to do the same for us if we are not "intended audience"

We do not need to tread more lightly ESPECIALLY since those who are asked to tread lightly always seem to be the ones for whom this isn't an academic exercise BUT a life experience. " turned me off to what you were trying to say?!' That usually indicated an unwillingness to listen unless catered to and also presents a glaring privilege of BEING ABLE TO BE TURNED OFF

( as soon as you can be turned off of hearing the latest anti arab anti islam fear mongering you let me I 'll throw a party)

The blogosphere has replicated again and again while purporting to challenge that because it is a written sphere and it is a technological sphere it is automatically governed my middle class "polite values"

SO here's what I've decide to do with this information

One I took it off that post because if I am going to be asked to " tread carefully" when discussing PERSONAL LIFE SPECIFIC experience even when I am considerate and non offensive in my language and armed with you know FACTS, is probably going to degenerate.

Cause I'm a hot head.

And secondly

I am going to personally ask you Nadia

NOT TO CHANGE A DAMN THING

We don't need to tread lightly . Some of us have had to tread lightly and be afraid of announcing our true lived experiences for so long for simple SURVIVAL . Tread lightly to me means nothing . What is needed is consideration and actual examination of what "people" we are asking and why. And also what this light treatment hopes to achieve. Because the honest discussion of the forces that subjugate,silence and choke the ability of people to express their truths and frustrations..?

Is only for those who can afford to watch and wait.

Yep I was much hotter about that than i thought I was

Love you girl

BA
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Dear World on a Bad Day

SO I got my phone stolen. Lets not think about what im missing the cost of replacing and the general shitty timing of losing a phone while engaging in a job hunt and being backlogged on email.

I got this from a fellow RED participant.

Now I should respond in some kind of amazonian fury and blah balh but frankly it's just basic at this point.

He links some completely unrelated protests, entirely and purposely spits half truths and misinformation about Jena and RED to sound as if he is the " enlightened one".

Now see how proud he is of his dependence on the titty of the New York Times to get his news it shows by you know the lack of facts ( and by facts I mean a single statistical,anecdotal or , editorial remark grounded in the stuff we call reality) . Coupled with the nice holier than thou brushing aside of the mission and MISSION statement of the Jena six protest. Marvel at his homophobic language , gasp at his derogatory characterization of the women as fat.

Be especially amused at the sheer lazyness and hamfisted " knowledge" he drops by doing no research or linking to know arguments.

Wait on second thought , see it for what it is

A fucking wack ass temper tantrum thrown by a psuedo intellectual making his lil piece of shine off of picking apart the shit other people do.

So go give him hit counts ya'll give him some attention praise him for his " realnesss'

Then maybe just maybe he will get the fuck out of grown folks business.

PS

I'm fat , I'm black and I'm even a nappy headed hoe but ya know what , I'm relevant and I'm original.

Howard Stern , Starr and Buckwild, and every other irascible " real talking" radio host called they want there fucking style back.
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