By MYCHAL DENZEL SMITH for Feministing When I was fifteen or sixteen, my father asked me if I was gay. As is his way, he didn’t actually ask me. He made a statement intended to elicit a response which would answer the question he really meant to ask. We have issues with communication in my family….
Written by Michelle Denise Jackson Contribution by Anushya Badrinath Growing up, I was a very nice girl. I was always the one who went out of her way to help her friends. I would loan them money, offer them advice, give them rides, and help them with school assignments. I usually did not expect…
How many times have you filled a form requesting you to state your sex or gender? Or sex AND gender, although you may not have encountered forms that ask for both because those who make them are ill informed that ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ are synonymous. So what is sex? What is gender? Sex is science,…
The phrase “Like A Girl” being used as an insult is a hard knock against any girl’s self-confidence. This ad highlights that in a manner of showing how adolescent young girls see themselves.
Last week, while sitting at a café waiting for a friend, I overheard (eavesdropped rather, since I’d finished with BuzzFeed) snippets from another table’s conversation. Since I don’t know the participants’ names I’m assigning numbers: Girl #1: ‘That movie was so sad! I’m still tearing up! I can’t believe you didn’t shed a tear! Girl…
When i was in 7th grade, some of us girls began to play a lot of football with the boys of our class. Thankfully, we had uniforms that allowed us to fall over, kick a ball and do splits in the air! It was tons of fun and we would eagerly wait for lunch hour…
What are feminine attributes? “Let’s just put down pink”, she said. “What, why?”, I asked. “There are so many silly women, with their frills and fancies, trying to be pretty and pink and fancy. Isn’t that a feminine attribute?” Even vociferous proponents of gender equality seem to hate ‘macho men’ and ‘pink women’. Let…
“Omg! That Kurt guy from Glee? What’s the deal with him! I don’t get it. He’s a boy but he sounds and behaves kind of like a girl. And Unique Adams! He’s a boy too but dresses up like a girl. I’m so confused!” A few days ago, I was approached to write for “Schools…
By Meghana Bhatt The proliferation of sexual violence and female oppression in India is truly disturbing. The Times of India recently reported that 95% of women in Delhi and the surrounding areas feel unsafe outdoors. While the recent gang rape of a student in Delhi has brought significant attention to this issue, male sexual dominance…
