Affirmative Action & the Election

Here's a video from my day job that I thought you'd enjoy over here...

UCLA Law Professor Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw addresses the presidential candidates' support of affirmative action programs.



Crenshaw wrote a recent article in Ms. Magazine about deceitful initiatives that are seeking to eliminate affirmative action.

She paints a grim picture saying, "Women and black people were denied the vote in the past; today, they are deceived out of their votes."

Definitely check out the full article.

Win a Brave Girl Shirt!

So Women's History Month is coming to an end. But when the month is over please don’t stop celebrating! Women and girls are creating change and making history every day.

I wanted to open this up for you to write about brave women and girls. Please post here about someone you know or someone you admire from a far.

On April 1st I'll pick one of the posts out of a hat and that person will get a free Brave Girl t-shirt!

Shirts come in kids sizes up to Adult XXL.

Hooked on Free Rice

Free Rice is this vocabulary game where each time you get a word right they donate 20 grains of rice to the United Nations Food Program.

I went to see what it was all about and next thing I knew an hour had passed. Thanks a lot Bitch Magazine!

Of course we should all be giving without expecting improved vocabulary or anything in return. I agree with Amy over at Bitch that "if this is the way we have to get people to give, we're all in some serious trouble."

But on the other hand, I would have been hooked on playing this game even if there wasn't anything philanthropic about it. So better that a rice donation was made than not.

Feminist Review on Sticker Sisters

Our Brave Girl Adventure Pack got written up on Feminist Review!

Here's a snippet:

"The products have broad appeal, as girls of all ages need shoelaces and the occasional boo-boo cover. I appreciated that you could order multiple items and have gifts for all the girls on your list, from daughters, nieces and students, to friends, co-workers, and your mom. Bonus points for the t-shirt being one of the softest in my closet, with the added perk of a printed-on label, so there is no pesky tag to cut out. The product slogans come across as more positive than militant, yet still hit the point home that being female is better than just acceptable, it’s downright preferable."

You can read the full review here.

New Word for Tomboy

Over at Shameless Magazine they're talking about an article in the Toronto Star called "Why 'tomboy' remains a loaded word."

The article quotes a description in the NY Times of actress Ellen Page as "a tomboy – her on-screen persona is sharp, clear-eyed, determined and self-consciously original."

Apparently a Sarah Lawrence professor wrote a response saying:

“It is unfortunate that we have no other word available to describe this strong, independent young woman than to refer to her as a tomboy. This continues to convey to girls that growing up clear-eyed and courageous is being like a boy.”

Well said!

I was the only girl on my baseball team when I was younger and have often been mistaken for a boy when I have short hair. But I can't think of an instance where I was directly called a tomboy. I definitely identified with boys when I was little and even wished to become one, but I never liked the word tomboy.

Were you ever called a tomboy? How do you feel about the term? What are other words we can use to describe strong girls? Does even having any word assume that it's unusual or unnatural for girls to be strong?

I heart Youth Radio

Just thinking today about how awesome Youth Radio is. Thanks to them, this morning on my drive to the day job, I heard some young people's reactions to the CDC study that everyone has been so shocked about the last few days.

The study claims that 1 in 4 teenage girls has a sexually transmitted disease and that the rate is close to 50% among African American young women.

My first thought: Maybe people will finally wake up and realize abstinence only programs aren't working! Maybe this will encourage more honest sex education. Maybe our country will invest in tons of prevention services and will make sure everyone has access. Maybe young people will be showered with knowledge, condoms, and everything else they need for safer sex.

My second (more realistic?) thought: Uh oh we're about to get bombarded with headlines shaming girls and calling them sluts.

My third thought: I assume all these girls aren't sleeping with each other so aren't they getting the STDs from guys? So what about them? We definitely don't need any more "CDC Shocker" scare tactic headlines about guys either, but why is all the attention and burden on the girls?

Marathon winner can't run away from sexism

I was watching the LA marathon on TV last weekend with my girlfriend because she's training for the San Francisco marathon in August. My first time watching a marathon and I got to see a woman win! Very cool.

But it was not cool what William Burke, co-founder and president of the City of Los Angeles Marathon, said about it. We're sitting enjoying the excitement of watching Tatiana Aryasova cross the finish line first and the station goes to Burke for a comment. "You can't keep those women down," he says. "You can't get them back in the kitchen." What?!?

There was so much shrieking coming from my house I didn't even hear the rest of the interview. For a few days I wasn't sure if I had dreamt that moment or if it really happened. Unfortunately, later in the week, Feministing (by way of the LA Times) verified that my ears hadn't deceived me. People commenting on Feministing have asked if maybe he was joking. It's possible, but I definitely didn't get that impression. He didn't smile, or wink, or laugh, or give any other clue that he was attempting to make a joke.

All I can say is keep running and let's leave this sexism in the dust!

Super Tuesday Procrastination

It's 11pm on the eve of Super Tuesday and I'm trying to study up and figure out what to vote for. Well if anyone's being real strict, technically I'm writing this blog post and further putting off making my decisions for tomorrow.

Occasionally I'll wait until the last minute to decide about one or two obscure measures, but I've never had it quite this bad. I'm no news junkie, but I get some at work, skim a few newspapers daily, and listen to a lot of NPR.

I relate to a lot of what Rebecca Traister writes in Undecided '08: Should I vote for Clinton or Obama?

I'm undecided at a moment -- one I thought might never transpire in my lifetime -- in which I will have the opportunity to pull a lever for a woman or an African-American. I am undecided while many around me whoop it up, volunteer, yell and cry at rallies, and feel the thrill of political certainty that I cannot share.

From what I can tell Obama and Clinton's stances on the issues are ridiculously close, so that hasn't really helped.

And I'm really trying not to let the identity politics influence my decision. From the much debated Gloria Steinem NY Times piece to NY NOW's scathing press release to e-mails from local feminist groups telling me to "Go vote for Hillary Clinton tomorrow," I'm tired of the feminist=must be for Clinton equation. But I also don't want my rebellion from that equation to be the deciding factor in my vote.

Metacentricies says it well:

This election isn’t about either gender or race. It is a historic occasion that the Democratic party will nominate someone who will be the first in history. That is significant enough. NY NOW’s stance (National NOW has been conciliatory) is divisive, at a time that divisiveness is destructive. We are in deep, deep shit as a country, and we need to find a way out of it. If you think Clinton is best (and not just because she has a vagina) then great. And if you think Obama is best (not just because he has dark skin) that’s great too. Do we need to add identity politics to an already challenging time?

Well, I guess I'll sleep on it.

But first a very appropriate cartoon (thanks feministing!):

nataliedee.com

Hillary Clinton's Visit

So I promised to give a full report on Hillary Clinton's visit to my work last Friday. But the weekend passed and I've been putting it off because, well, it just wasn't that eventful. There was a whole lot of "hurry-up and wait, hurry-up and wait." I think the highlight for me was meeting the secret service. Mostly I had to sit and wait in a dark room and then run around like crazy, so it wasn't like I could really take it all in. A bunch of my coworkers ran smack into Hillary Clinton and saw her off in her motorcade when they went to get lunch, but I was inside working on getting her video online.

Her interview was interesting, but I didn't think it was anything earth shattering. She talked about being annoyed at the media for their obsession with her being a woman and showing her feelings. She tells this story about being at a meeting with other women leaders in Finland:

Here we were in a country where women have enormously achieved equal rights that we hardly can even imagine. What did we talk about?

How frustrated they were that every time they made a serious about monetary policy or defense policy, it was reported what they were wearing or what their husbands thought or what their children thought. So we're moving into a future that nobody's ever lived before, so I don't fault the press because they're doing the best they can to make sense out of all of this. But how many stories do they need to write about the same thing?

It feels weird to be outing the worker bee part of my life here, but now you know what I do at my day job. Sort of. Maybe. A little.

Hillary in the House

Hillary Clinton's coming to my work tomorrow. It's going to be a zoo, but I'm excited. I'll give a full report afterwards.

In the meantime you can check out opinions from Margaret Cho, Gloria Feldt, and others on what they think will happen If Hillary Wins...

Happy 35th Anniversary Roe v. Wade!

Lots of great stuff going on today to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision to legalize abortion.

Check out all the bloggers taking part in NARAL's Blog for Choice Day.

Also take a look at Planned Parenthood's Wall of Protest where you can "express your outrage over the Federal Abortion Ban." Beware it loads pretty slow. But I guess that means lots of people have contributed images, so slow is a good thing. The one thing I don't really understand is the images of people's pets up there. I mean I've never asked my cat if she's pro-choice, but maybe I should get on that!

I know there's a lot of talk about how Roe v. Wade is being eroded and reproductive choice is in jeopardy, but I've never felt like young people were really behind that. I mean we've grown up our whole lives with Roe v. Wade. I try not to pay too much attention to polls, but I was kind of freaked out to read that teens and young adults seem less pro-choice than older generations.

I read this today in the LA Times:

Looking specifically at teens, a Gallup survey in 2003 found that 72% called abortion morally wrong, and 32% believed it should be illegal in all circumstances. Among adults surveyed that year, only 17% backed a total ban.

The article talks about antiabortion clubs and summer camps for middle and high school students. Really? Antiabortion summer camp?! I had no idea.

Well we better keep fighting. Here's to many more choice filled years!

"Pregnant" Boys

What do you think about these new ads about teen pregnancy put out by One Milwaukee? Seeing an image of a teenage boy who appears to be pregnant is definitely attention getting, but I don't know if it does much more than that. And I personally wouldn't use the word "disturbing" to describe teen pregnancy.

Stacey over at Shameless has a good point: "I don’t like perpetuating this idea that if boys got pregnant, then socially we’d suddenly care about the issue."

What do you think about these ads?

More Girls Fighting?

So I'm driving to work this morning listening to Day to Day on NPR and I hear the host proclaiming,"'Fight like a girl' used to be an expression that meant you didn't fight all that hard or all that violently. Well things have changed."

My ears perk up. Did I miss something? Is this cause for celebration? Are people not using "like a girl" as an insult anymore? Welllll...not quite. The story is about videos posted on YouTube showing girls fighting each other. They say in it that girls are getting in physical fights with each other more often than in the past. Not sure what the past is to them, but I definitely remember fights among girls when I was in middle and high school. But maybe it is getting more common. What do you think?

There was one part of the story that was especially annoying. Dr. Louis Kraus at Rush University says, "We see more girls interacting in competitive sports. We've seen girls get into more fights." Are we supposed to draw some connection between girls being more involved in sports and getting in more fights? What happened to sports being so good for girls?

And then they talk to a thirteen-year-old who says, "Guys aren't better than girls. Girls can fight too." Ah equality at last. But seriously let's strive for no fighting.

Oh but the Dr. Kraus guy brings up a good point at the end about how schools are less likely to take fights among girls as seriously as fights among guys. Teachers and administrators often see girls' fights as "skirmishes" and are less likely to intervene. Hopefully awareness will do a little something to help people not diminish girls' activities and expressions (however unacceptable).

The Power of Stickers

So last week I went to my first sticker art show called Peel Here 07. The stickers ranged from fancy stickers printed on shiny origami style paper displayed in frames to sharpie doodles on those priority mail stickers you can get from the post office.

A lot of the stuff wasn't really my style. Maybe it was just me, but I couldn't get into the scary clown and one-eyed bunny illustrations. But it was amazing to see the range of stickers and how much they can mean to their creators and the people who see them.

One of the best features of the show was outside where they had set up a bus bench and newspaper boxes for people to sticker. Not that those kept people contained to only stickering the dedicated areas. For blocks around the show you could see small groups of kids lifting each other up to slap stickers up on street signs and light posts.

It was all very inspiring and made me want to make more stickers. And not that this show is representative of the sticker world, but in any case we need more feminist stickers!

Some pictures from the show...

Gifts For Girls and Holiday Orders

I've been busy getting a new sticker printed and December seems to have snuck up on me. I hope those of you in the Midwest and New York are surviving the winter weather. I'm drinking some hot chocolate for you right now!

Anyway this sticker elf is ready to get your holiday orders out to all the brave, strong girls in your life.

To make your job as awesome aunt/mother/grandmother/friend even easier this year, we've got spiffy new gift boxes and can ship your order directly to the recipient. So go ahead and add wrapping and a personalized card to any order. Our new gift packaging is made of recycled materials so it’s easier on the environment too!



Have a great holiday season!

P.S. If you need gifts in time for Xmas, please place orders by December 19th.

New GIRLS ROCK Vinyl Stickers

A little while ago a Sticker Sister fan named Justine wrote and said, "It would be great if you had some tougher/ waterproof stickers so we could put them on our car and water bottles and
stuff!"

She wasn't the only one who's been asking for stickers made out of stronger material, so here you go! I'd like to introduce you to the brand new Girls Rock vinyl stickers. This sticker can withstand water and won’t rip. It has a 4-inch diameter so it’s big enough to stand out on a car bumper, but small enough to fit on a notebook or water bottle.

So grab a few and start sticking! They also make a great little treat to include in holiday cards or xmas stockings.

Giving Thanks (and not giving thanks)

So I spent yesterday with my mom, grandma, aunt, and cousin. There were moments when they drove me crazy of course, but overall I felt so lucky to be surrounded by such strong, awesome women and one smart, spunky eleven-year-old. This Thanksgiving I'm thankful for all the wonderful people in my life, but especially the amazing, brave girls and women I know.

Hopefully you'll have a chance during the holiday to think about all the awesome girls in your life. And keep in mind that Sticker Sisters has dozens of smart, spunky stickers, t-shirts, and gifts with celebratory, encouraging messages for girls of all ages. And you don't have to wrestle the crowds at the mall to get the goodies!

Okay, well just to round out this little mushy love fest, here are a couple things I won't be giving thanks for this year.

1) Turkeys that look like headless women's bodies (in a bikini no less!) waiting to be carved up. Misogyny on a plate. Ugh just what this holiday needed.

2) The upcoming Spice Girls reunion tour. Really? Oh please please don't say they're back.

But seriously--what are you thankful for and not thankful for today?

More Spooky Stereotypes

So it's old news that Halloween costumes for women and girls keep getting "sexier" and more stereotypical. Not to mention all the racist "ethnic" costumes. And then there's the "sexy," "ethnic" costumes. Those really take the cake.

But apparently there's a new fad for men and boys. Move over scary costumes, this year "muscle" costumes are all the rage. From "Mini Muscle Man Infant" to "Macho Biker Man Adult" costumes, there's no scarcity of stereotypes for guys either.


Tolerance.org has a list of questions to help identify stereotypes in costumes:

WEARING A FUNNY COSTUME?
Ask yourself: Is the humor based on "making fun" of real people, real human traits or cultures?

Though intended to be funny, last season’s "Mental Patient" costume by Disguise was considered demeaning, dehumanizing, and humiliating to individuals struggling with a mental illness and their families. Complete with a "Hannibal" type mask and a straightjacket, the costume reinforced stereotypes and fears about persons with mental illness.


WEARING A SCARY COSTUME?
Ask yourself: Is the "fear factor" based on real forms of violence or grotesque depictions of human traits?

"This scary stud can empty out a full house just by walking through the door," touts the tag line for Fright Catalog’s "Vato Loco" mask. The bandana clad, tattooed, brown-skinned vinyl creation makes light of gang violence, which takes a serious toll on families and neighborhoods across the country. The costume also sends the message that Latinos are violent.


WEARING A HISTORICAL COSTUME?
Ask yourself: If the costume is meant to be historical, does it further misinformation or historical and cultural inaccuracies?

The "Indian" get-up prevails each year as culture-turned-costume. But did you know few Native Americans wore buckskin and headbands and even fewer wore them together? Did you know "war paint" and feathers carry religious meaning and were never worn by Native American children?


WEARING A "BEAUTIFUL" COSTUME?
Ask yourself: If the costume is meant to be beautiful, are these characteristics drawn from commercial references, such as movie characters?

Too often, beautiful at Halloween means white, blonde, princess masks. What statement does your Halloween costume make about what constitutes beauty -- and about who is beautiful and who isn't?


WEARING A "CULTURAL" COSTUME?
Ask yourself: Does the costume reduce cultural differences to jokes?

People like Leigha Baugham, a former communications student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, believe when it comes to picking Halloween costumes, we should "keep our hands out of the melting pot."

There are a zillion great things to dress up as that don't promote stereotypes. My favorite costumes have been a tube of toothpaste, a jellyfish, a gecko, a teabag, and a picnic. What great costumes have you worn or seen?