Ana’s Comments (group member since Jan 08, 2016)

Ana’s comments from the Our Shared Shelf group.

Hello! Here to send this thread up with some very useful material for our OSS male members...

The MPE Reader

I gotta thank a friend of mine for this useful resource, which description I'll post below...

The Reader is a compilation of articles, essays, and tools pertaining to masculinities and sexual violence that engage critically with race, gender, and sexuality, among other things, in really meaningful and, hopefully, supportive and fruitful ways.

Of course, all are more than welcome to read this material, but it really is geared towards men who understand gender and women issues and truly want to help change stuff. Hope it'll be useful to many of our members, either for themselves or for their acquaintances!!!

If I remember correctly, she identified herself as Jewish in the essay, right? Certain points of her article speak of someone who might still be observant or at the very least with a deep influence of past beliefs. I'm not saying we should celebrate her as the ultimate 21st century feminist because her essay strongly suggests otherwise, but I also think it takes some valuable thought and effort to get to feminism from a religious background. She does deserve the criticism, but I can't help but cut her some slack. As one of you said above, also, this will hopefully be an experience for her, and feminism is very much something to learn. In fact, the learning curve is steep. I know I've had ideas that were not "very feminist" in the past -nothing outrageous, but certainly plenty of room for reflection and improvement. Because I am not a public character, I get to learn along the way somewhat privately. A small perk compared to their privilege? Yes, indeed. By all means call Bialik out. However, let's not forget that people can change and think twice and make new statements. I'll save my harshness for Weinstein.

She really is getting a lot of heat in the comments to this follow-up, too: http://ti.me/2gouwGf

Oh, there's also something that came to my mind just after I finished writing my post above.

So, back to the final sentence of the essay:

The best part is you don’t have to go to a hotel room or a casting couch to find them.

Just by reading this, one gets the idea that all of Weinstein's victims knew what was going on and were either 'naïve' or 'used but knowing'. I am sure this would be quite the wrong assumption, which is another problematic point with the article.

Hmmmm. I think I can get the point of those accusing Bialik of victim blaming. She does say this, which in my opinion is important:

Women should be able to wear whatever they want. They should be able to flirt however they want with whomever they want. Why are we the ones who have to police our behavior?

In a perfect world, women should be free to act however they want. But our world isn’t perfect. Nothing — absolutely nothing — excuses men for assaulting or abusing women.

So perhaps I am naive myself, but as she says these things, I think I can believe she has her best intentions at heart when writing this article.

But we can’t be naïve about the culture we live in.

This is a statement that I feel uncomfortable to say I agree with. Identifying as a feminist has helped me see lots of things in a different way. It hasn't changed the fact that when I go out at night I always take a taxi home and ask the driver to please wait for me as I enter my building, or the fact that when I travel solo I do some research on which places I "should" and "should not" go alone. To me this is a practical instance of can't be naïve about the culture we live in. Because it sure sucks, but I still do all those things and many more that are by now interiorised. So I don't think it'd be fair of me to object to that, It does, however, make me feel uncomfortable and, most importantly, frustrated, as often I feel like this is the end point of any conversation on that toxic culture.

Now, Bialik may have had the best intentions at heart, but her essay still does rub me off at several points...

In the meantime, I plan to continue to work hard to encourage young women to cultivate the parts of themselves that may not garner them money and fame. If you are beautiful and sexy, terrific. But having others celebrate your physical beauty is not the way to lead a meaningful life.

So why is it that we women can't have it all, I thought as I read. We either hurt ourselves because to attain conventional beauty or if we have it, we have to be careful not to become a cautionary tale, because it is dangerous, or empty, or not fruitful. I know I am guilty myself of this second trail of thought - Look at so-and-so, so vapid, looks is all they are. Hey, and sometimes the criticism is valid. Sometimes beautiful people, women included, are vapid. But the stereotyping is yet another mechanism of control and submission coming from above, I feel. Above meaning a patriarchal mindset.

And if — like me — you’re not a perfect 10, know that there are people out there who will find you stunning, irresistible and worthy of attention, respect and love. The best part is you don’t have to go to a hotel room or a casting couch to find them.

I would hope that those who are (not, nobody ever is, but traditionally closer to) a perfect 10 will know that as well, and that they, too, do not have to pay a steep price to find them, I don't like this ending. It's kind of a word of caution to girls, disguised as warm feelings and acceptance, even unintentionally so.

I believe that we can change our culture, but it won’t be something that happens overnight. We live in a society that has treated women as disposable playmates for far longer than Mr. Weinstein has been meeting ingénues in luxury hotel rooms.

Yes, indeed. It's not that it won't, it actually hasn't. However, as I said before, this feels like a dead end. Because it won't happen overnight, let's keep being cautious, girls. Let's seek other attributes in our identities. Let's. Let's. Let's. Which, OK. But once again, the main burden is placed on our shoulders. I don't want to take responsibility away from us, we are women, not children, and as adults a healthy society is as much our right as it is our duty. But let's make sure victims are still seen as victims, and predators as predators.

Terrible things happen to all kinds of women, all the time, in all industries. I don't entirely dislike Bialik's essay and, as I said, I don't think a harsh judgement is deserved here. But it is not a perfect essay. The bright side, I guess, is that it's one more adding to the voices raised against scandals such as this one, where there hardly were any before.

Hey hey! So following Anne Elisabeth's generous offer, we've opened a thread for exchanging/swapping/giving away books that do not belong to our official reading list. Check it here, it'll stay pinned for easy references!

Closing and archiving this now! :D

Aaaaaand I changed the title (slightly) again, as per Meerder's wise suggestion to just include all girls, either cis or trans, while keeping the focus on the whole of the umbrella in its acronym. :) Please do keep the conversation going! :)

Interestingly enough, I just checked the website for the Boy Scouts in Spain and girls are very welcome to join. I say interestingly not only because currently it is clearly different to the situation in other countries, but also because, to the best of my knowledge, they were just as welcoming of girls all throughout my childhood and teenage years. Not that I ever joined, but I seem to remember several instances of acquaintances in my circle being girl scouts! Glad to report a different picture here. :)

Hello, everybody! Ana here. :)

Inspired by the generosity of some fellow members lately, we decided to set a separate Pay It Forward thread for books that are not part of the OSS Official Reading List! :D

A few rules will help us keep this tidy and, after all, within OSS scope...

1) Books should have some sort of direct/indirect link to women/gender issues and/or feminism.
2) As always, kindly refrain from self-promotion of any kind whatsoever.
3) For safety sake, please keep addresses / personal details private!
4) No illegal ebooks, please!
5) For those of you with piles of books to swap/give away, it'd be a good idea to simply update your list if/when necessary.
6) Feel free to comment whether you'd like a particular book. Who knows, someone might have it!

Happy reading! :)

Hello, everyone!

Should girls and transgendered (LGBT) be allowed to join Boy Scouts of America?

To the original poster of this thread, I'm sure you had your best intentions at heart, but this is kind of an awkward title for the thread. If we say girls and transgendered, we are implying that trans girls are not 'real' girls. Transgendered is not a valid adjective -we should use it as a noun, i.e. transgender.
Last but not least, indicating the "LGBTQ" in brackets right after "transgender" could also wrongly lead to think that transgender people are necessarily also L/G/B or any other of the letters under the umbrella (currently spelt as LGBTQIA, if I'm not mistaken), when that doesn't really have to be true.
I hope the title I wrote instead will be more accurate and, above all, save the hurt for those of our members who might see it and feel unsafe here. Other suggestions welcome! I am cisgender and, no matter how hard I try, I am sure some of my own ways may be mistaken. :)

Hmmm, yet another film to add to my list. Thanks, Rustom! :)

There is indeed, and in fact I was revising it right now! However, so far it has only been related to the books comprising our official list. For now, I think Anne's most generous offer can stay here. :) Anne, that's so lovely! Thanks a lot for your generosity. :)

Soooo, I know this is not the same as what you originally asked, Giulia, but to me it's kinda there. You could try and read The Incest Diary, by an anonimous woman who endured the abuse of her father since she was three, with said abuse turning into an abusive sexual relationship that lasted for 18 years. As you can imagine, lots of mixed feelings and thoughts thrown in there, although I haven't read it myself because I think it's more than I can stomach (I fully recognise the potential use of such a book being around, though!).
I think Susan has a valid point. I will acknowledge that if I think of such acts and their perpetrators my mind is way too occupied with the common thoughts of disgust and repulse. I think the reflection on these men needs to be a very careful one, so as not to find ourselves justificating their crimes, even unvoluntarily so. Redemption...I wonder if such is available to people like that. If I have to be honest, I don't think so. But I would welcome any research / debate / etc. that would help eradicate abuse and assault.

Ester wrote: "Hasta Julio de este año yo solo sabía que Emma era la niña que recordaba con mucho cariño de Harry Potter.Por casualidad después de ver una reposición de una película de esta saga, me entro curiosi..."

¡Contigo somos un poco más fuertes! :) Bienvenida a OSS, Ester. Espero que esta comunidad pueda aportarte algo valioso junto a los buenos ratos de lectura. :) No dudes en dirigirte a cualquiera del equipo de moderación si tienes dudas o preguntas.

I am sure that many of you already know about this hate crime, in bold because I want to make clear my thoughts, but just in case some of you didn't, I wanted to share here the horrific, gruesome murder and torture of Ally Lee Steinfeld, a trans girl, a teenager.

Why is the brutal murder of this trans teen not a hate crime?

Ally Steinfeld is the reason we cannot accept transphobia. Need more? Well...

These Are the Trans People Killed in 2017

Transexuality is not a mental illness.
Transexuality is not against nature.
Transexual people do not owe an explanation to anyone.
Transexual people do not have to justify their existence.

When we allow people to say Yeah, but... we are not helping to improve things. We are not helping people stay safe.

Fairly interesting discussion you've got going on in here!

To me, privilege works in layers. Some of them, you are under, some of them you are on top (I'm not sure if this was the right way to explain it, haha.) This applies to many of us -to all, in fact. It's just that some of those layers are so heavy, they render the others nearly insignificant. Nearly. The Color Purple comes to mind. Each and every of the COC (characters of colour) in that novel bowed under the weight of others' unfair privilege. Yet women had it clearly worse, which mean only one thing -men, even men of colour, retained some privilege.

Just like that, I am female. I am therefore (so far, may my fellow women in the future escape from it) irrevocably affected by my gender. I am, also, middle class at best -many of my aspirations and dreams are tangled in what some have conveniently defined as 'reality' so that the rest of us will swallow the pill more easily. Those two remain true -not less, but also no more than some other facts:

-I am white, and my whiteness is a protective cloak no matter where I go;
-I am from a privileged country that belongs to a privileged system. I am *Spanish*, I am *European*. Those two statuses immediately grant me certain benefits and plenty of coziness when navigating the world;
-While the above mentioned comment on my being very much trapped in 'reality' does apply, I do not know the meaning of the word 'hunger'. I have never lived in poverty. I have been able to go abroad when I needed it.

And so on. :)

Tiffany, far from being absolutely pessimistic, I would say that, with a bit of luck on our side, your coworker may not be entirely beyond hope. He is grossly misinformed and entrenched in his nice little nest...but surely there's a silver lining, no matter how thin, if you could at least have a first conversation with him.

Now I said I'm not 'absolutely' pessimistic, which means I still have a healthy dosage of it that would incline me to disagree with Winston, or at the very least, to question his thoughts.

But also we should recognize that your coworker did indeed work hard and deserves a manner of respect, even as he is willfully unsympathetic to others.

This is OK with me. I do agree with you that many of the, uh, milquetoast white people have worked rather hard...as humans often have to.

If we can find the best way to make the discussion/argument to always be respectful of the narrative to the men [the privileged], with their own difficulties for sure. And then without taking away from that respect, emphasis the difference of women narratives [or any marginalized group]

I mean, don't take me wrong, I get your point, and I am sure you, in particular, are able to deliver it through your actions, and I can only hope I would be an example of that myself. However, how well would this work when out there? Would it even work at all? 'To be respectful of the narrative of the privileged', sadly enough, that would most likely end up in their privilege being strenghtened. Even if it's the opposite of our intentions.

On the topic of Hugh Hefner, I will say that I found this article to be fairly well written and eloquent.

Good riddance to an abusive creep

(Credit of my finding it to my fellow mod Katelyn!)

I will acknowledge that I do struggle a bit with the role of those women voluntarily entering the Playboy universe and everything it entailed. Many of them were actively seeking fame and opportunities and I do not think we can say that they weren't aware of the transaction going on there. However, I think the real conflict appears when we reflect on the nature of that transaction, on the mechanisms that allow it to exist and for those women to know that joining the Playboy harem was a way to try and achieve an acting / modelling / etc. career.

As for the merits of Playboy as a magazine, I think they are compatible with what the article exposes.

Hello everybody!

Thought I would share a couple of recent losses (one of them today, sigh) of female activists that devoted their lives to noble causes directly or indirectly related to feminism. They are Edith Windsor, LGBTQIA activist who scored the tremendous success of same-sex marriage in the US and
Kate Millett, author of the bestsellerSexual Politics . I thought both of them deserve that we share their legacy and efforts. :)

Holly wrote: "No worries! I found ALL THE OTHER posts about this and the link to the FAQs. Apologies all x"

Don't worry, Holly! It's quite the large community nowadays, and I can tell you that even us mods have a hard time navigating through all the threads sometimes. :) Feel free to ask us if you ever really find yourself scratching your head at something. :)

Also, since our fellow member Camille kindly shared another rec with us in a duplicate thread, I am pasting her text here so that it won't get lost. Thanks a lot, Camille! Hope you don't mind me doing this, I'd have hated to lose your rec,

While I am fully aware this is a book club, I thought I would share a (free) podcast database, that I have found really useful over the years, with other OSS readers, if it's alright to focus on a medium other than books in this thread.
The London School of Economics hosts many lectures and conferences during the academic year and most of these events are recorded and posted on this website: http://www.lse.ac.uk/website-archive/...
Of course the topics are extremely diverse (they range from politics or economics to science or philosophy) but, while browsing, I realised that many of them touch upon matters that are of interest to us: women in public life, women in religion, women in war, women in science, women careers... There are so many!
So, for instance, two days ago, I listened to the podcast of "Drop the Ball: how women can achieve more with doing less" (talk + Q&A) with author Tiffany Dufu and found it both thought-provoking and inspirational: http://www.lse.ac.uk/website-archive/...
What I also appreciate about the medium, to be completely honest, is that it gives you a pretty good idea of the core of a book or a speaker's views in about an hour and a half, which (while not ideal) is a good substitute when you don't have time to actually read the book or the body of work.
So if anybody feels like listening to, recommending or discussing any of these LSE podcasts, I'd be really happy to engage in conversation :)

Hello there, peeps!

Got a few podcast recs these days in the shape of articles that mentioned them, so I thought I would share with you all...

13 Podcasts By Women You Should Be Listening To Right Now

17 Queer and Feminist Latinx Podcasts To Get Into

Stuff Mom Never Told You

Strong Opinions Loosely Held

The Guilty Feminist

Arte Radio: Noir is the New Black (French)

La Poudre (French)

Enjoy them and please, please, don't forget to share your own recs here! :)