this song would pierce her heart

Modesty Codes in Pentecostalism and Mormonism (Feminism and Religion)

pagannews:

“You look like a lesbian.” “Why do you want to look like a man?” “Hey, boy head!” These were just some of the responses I got from friends and family when I decided to cut off my hair. The gendered connotations that come with how one decides to wear one’s hair are an overarching signifier of the dominant culture’s obsession with normative appearances. Many religious institutions and congregations uphold normative understandings of appearance and dress. Growing up in a conservative town in rural South Georgia and being raised within a Pentecostal tradition came with many challenges regarding gender, sexuality, and dress.

In an earlier post on FAR, I described my experiences with my church and my community regarding sexuality in “Sexual Ethics and Southern Belles.” In this post, I want to further explore those thoughts to discuss modesty codes within my own Pentecostal denomination, The Church of God, and within the LDS Church. Both Mormonism and The Church of God promote modesty codes that are ultimately harmful to girls and women.

Read more at Feminism and Religion

(via pagannews-deactivated20130221)

I’m trying to prove that people can love someone who is gender fluid/gender queer/gender neutral.

suburbanamnesia:

cenori:

cosmictuesdays:

aspiretobeinfinite:

My friends don’t believe me that it can happen. They say that’s why my relationships failed in the past and will fail. That’s the reason I’m single. Please like or reblog this if you disagree with them.

EDIT: They are now taking bets that I can’t find 2k people who are on my side. Lovely friends I have, eh?

They sound less like friends and more like assholes.

Yep.

I’m sorry your friends are bigoted jerks. <3

Your “friends” suck.

(via midnightonthefiringline)

skankassqueer:

microaggressions:

At the company I’m working at this summer, I’m the only intern programmer who is female.  Whenever I meet someone new who realizes I’m a programmer, they usually end up commenting at how lucky I am, because “software companies always want to hire women!”

Makes me feel like people in the industry will always see me first for my sex, and second for my technical abilities and accomplishments, if at all.

woman is a gender not a sex god damn it

what you said. though, this person is equating “female” (a biological sex) with “woman” (a gender presentation), so her problem isn’t that she’s female or a woman, it’s that people perceive that aspect of herself to be the most important thing. that being said, if she was biologically male and presented as a woman, she would still have this problem, so it’s still what you said.

(via skankassqueer-deactivated201207)

steviemcfly:

microaggressions:

Happy Meal toy promotions have recently been separated into “girl” and “boy.” The ones I want are labeled “boy toys.” Guess only boys like video games and Pokémon. 

If by “recently,” you mean “always.”

This has always happened.

I’m not saying it’s good. It’s not. But it’s also not new.

what steviemcfly said.

maymay:

“Japanese pornography is so dominant here [in China] and they really promote the image of young innocent submissive female, and they appear to be underage. I interviewed a lot of guys who say that, yes, this is my primary fantasy. I want to see this submissive girl. What does it mean? I think it means that it gives the guy the sense of empowerment. They can handle the submissive girl. So in this fantasy world, they can deal with this kind of girl, but it doesn’t mean that they have this girl in real life but the fact that they have to probably deal with the quite powerful women around them. In Japan there are studies explaining that this fantasy is a reversal, a sense of weakness and incompetence that Japanese male was like spoiled by mothers also. In China it’s a little bit similar. […] I found a lot of Chinese men and Chinese women have different aspirations…so does it have anything to do with the fact that they create the fantasy of easy submissive girl. Maybe it’s related. It’s a kind of reversal, that they can dream about submissive girl, but in reality, those Chinese men are rejected so badly by Chinese women, for instance on dating sites. The Chinese women are very demanding, and they publicize their requirements. And the Chinese men feel quite bad in a way. So I can see that Hong Kong and China is patriarchic. And I know that in reality, in the workplace, and at home, men have a lot of power. But that’s also just one way of investigating the reality. There’s also other realities where women have a lot of power as well.”

—Dr. Katrien Jacobs, interviewed on China: Sex, Censorship and the Rise of ‘People’s Porn’ by Global Voices

(See also: Anti-censorship best practices for the sex-positive publisher.)

microaggressions:

“It doesn’t make sense to consider street harassment ‘real’ harassment, or pretty soon men won’t even be able to talk to women without it being called sexism.”

—My dad. As someone who is harassed almost daily and has had bad experiences with street harassers, I got visibly upset and he told me to stop being so sensitive. Made me feel alone.

FUCK THAT. you are not alone. I, for one, have gotten similar responses to my dis-inclination to put up with street harassers, too, so. (See also “humorless feminist” just for good measure. ugh)

16andnotpregnant:

microaggressions:

“When my boyfriend’s siblings begin telling rape jokes and expect me to find them funny. When my boyfriend himself sometimes casually uses rape in regards to video games or daily life. I am 19, in Midwestern US. Makes me feel belittled, hurt and misunderstood, like what happened to me is acceptable.”

Chose your words carefully because you never know who you could be hurting.

^^^^^^ what she said.

microaggressions:

“I need to know: are you looking for a career, or are you looking to get married?”

—My boss, during a discussion on whether the company should pay for me to get a master’s degree. I am 24, in a large US city corporate office.

My response (only in my head, I’m afraid) would be, “I need to know: what makes you think I can’t do both? And also, I need to know: would you ask a guy that?” Because… seriously.

microaggressions:

“Are you normal?”

—My father asked me this when he found out I was sharing an apartment with two girls and not dating them. I am a gay male. Made me feel: sad and afraid of how he would react if I were to come out to him; like I have to lie and hide who I am to gain his acceptance; angry that he would assume that I am sleeping with my friends of the opposite gender.

The answer is yes, you are “normal” or no, no one is “normal”.

microaggressions:

“I like to imagine you as a girl but your sentence structure and rhetoric is so concise and to the point which points to the contrary (nothing against women, simply factual).”

—Things like this keep showing up as questions for Tumblr blogs that focus on specific subjects. This in particular was sent to writingadvice.tumblr.com. Made me feel like I’m never going to be taken seriously because of the assumption that women (sorry, girls) are more like rocks than human beings with actual brain function.

I had something relatively intelligent to say about this (besides: fume rage kill) but my browser crashed and I lost it all before I could post it. So, we’re back to incoherent anger.