ayomeredith asked: thank you so much! :)
Happy to help. It’s bizarre to me that the culture simultaneously seems to grasp the problems with constructed and idealized gender norms, while still not bothering to understand, or give a shit. Thanks for doing your cool, creative part towards awakening the beast.
Just wanted to share these great images by ayomeredith:
For this body of work, entitled “Hailee”, I photographed my 11 year old niece in scenes which exemplified qualities of the “perfect woman”. In the United States, these qualities include being beautiful, smart, sexy, able to cook and clean, all while still being pure and innocent. I created this portfolio to illustrate the pressures women feel to be all of these things, and to show how these ideals are being instilled in girls’ minds from a very young age…
“Today, students, parents, teachers and community members gathered on 61st and Cottage Grove to protest school closings which will have a direct impact on their safety. They called for resources to be given to them, not taken away. Towards the end of the protest, several students and allies blocked traffic in a symbolic die-in and were arrested..” — Sarah-Ji Fotografa
Sister Megan said her only regret was waiting so long to stage her protest. “It is manufacturing that which can only cause death,” she said.
In a statement to the court, Boertje-Obed said: “Nuclear weapons do not provide security. Our actions were providing real security and exposing false security.”
The three activists admitted cutting the fence to get into the site, walking around, spray-painting words, stringing out crime scene tape and chipping a wall with hammers. They spent two hours inside.
They also sprayed the exterior of the complex with baby bottles containing human blood.
When a guard approached, they offered him food and started singing.
First ever domestic abuse ad in Saudi Arabia. I lived in Saudi Arabia once and agree with Redditor ofthreesteps that it’s going to take more than a clever ad to change the culture in the country. Still, change is happening there, however slowly: a Saudi prince recently made a public case for allowing women to drive (though mainly for economic reasons…).
Last month, a New Jersey middle school banned girls from wearing strapless dresses to prom. Administrators claimed that the dresses were “distracting” — though they refused to specify exactly how or why. Parents reacted strongly to the rule; some supported the dress code while others deemed it “slut-shaming.” On Friday, the school compromised by allowing […]
Sonia Gutierrez: The Journey. The Impact. The Future (2012)
The Carlos Rosario Intl. Public Charter School has been an institution for decades now in Washington, D.C. — in fact, the only charter school in the city serving adults. The school has played an enormous role for providing job training and language skills for immigrants to the country. This video was part of an event to honor one of the school’s founders, Sonia Gutierrez, after 40 years of service to the community. Even Mayor Vincent Gray was in attendance! To learn more about her, read the honorary words she received by the House of Representative.
Stephen Colbert lead a triumphant charge through national television, openly mocking the despicable global austerity movement in light of a class paper by grad student Thomas Herndon. It demonstrated that a major study underpinning austerity logic was based on spreadsheet errors. Click for videos.
This is the root of the problem: the representative government serves a mixture of public opinion and the funding class, 0.05% of Americans.
“There is a corruption at the heart of American politics, caused by the dependence of Congressional candidates on funding from the tiniest percentage of citizens. That’s the argument at the core of this blistering talk by legal scholar Lawrence Lessig. With rapid-fire visuals, he shows how the funding process weakens the Republic in the most fundamental way, and issues a rallying bipartisan cry that will resonate with many in the U.S. and beyond.”
What can you do? There’s a lot going on these days. Try to keep up. Also, here are a few places to get involved:
Ensure passage of the American Anti-Corruption Act.
Demand the Fair Elections Now Act.
Be a gadfly — ask questions, engage with the puzzling, bigger picture.
WASHINGTON
After nearly a decade of promises that the nation was on the brink of a technological, economic, and scientific golden age, citizens across the country confirmed Monday they are now realizing a bold new era of American innovation is just … (more)
“The young men were far more shaped by life in America than the Northern Caucasus – both had lived in the US for more than a decade – and they expressed an alienation from American society. Indeed, their nihilistic act had much in common with mass school shootings by young men in recent times (Columbine, Aurora, Newtown) – that is, it was seemingly motiveless and suicidal violence undertaken by young males.
While the authorities and the media are searching frantically for proof of the brothers’ motives, they miss that this search itself is revealing. The Tsarnaevs’ unwillingness to claim responsibility or provide a reason highlights that this was not a political or ideological act. The bombings were really an end in themselves, an attention-seeking temper tantrum by disaffected youth.”
The economy is growing, but it’s making little difference to most Americans. Money is continuing to concentrate among the nation’s wealthiest. In this case, much of the rise is due to the booming stock market. It’s long been said that the stock market is almost entirely the domain of the super wealthy elite — these recent findings underline that clearly.
“During the first two years of the nation’s economic recovery, the mean net worth of households in the upper 7% of the wealth distribution rose by an estimated 28%, while the mean net worth of households in the lower 93% dropped by 4%, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of newly released Census Bureau data.”
Unemployment and underemployment are still high, over 50 million Americans live below the poverty line (even though most have jobs), and the costs of accessing a thriving, human life are continuing to rise quickly (e.g. education, healthcare).
via gadflies-org
The Revolution is Love
“You can’t evict an idea whose time has come.” — Occupy Wall Street
(via gadflies-org)
“Speaking is physically difficult for me. But my feelings are clear: I’m furious. I will not rest until we have righted the wrong these senators have done, and until we have changed our laws so we can look parents in the face and say: We are trying to keep your children safe. We cannot allow the status quo — desperately protected by the gun lobby so that they can make more money by spreading fear and misinformation — to go on.” (Gabby Giffords)
