August 16th, 2015
from Nat
- “It’s great that sex workers can finally feel like they are listened to. This is huge. We’ve been fighting for this for years.” Amnesty International released their policy in support of the decriminalization of sex work, and for the safety of sex workers. Let’s pressure our governments to put it into practice!
- “I was going through all these crazy thoughts and analyzing whether I was ether a) a crazy chick who needs to just calm down and reach for an effing tampon or b) a liberated boss madame who loved her own body, was running an effing marathon and was not in the mood for being oppressed that day.” Kiran Gandhi’s account of running the London Marathon on her period, without menstrual products, went viral this week, and the world gained another badass hero.
- Have you watched “M3LL155X”, FKA Twigs’ new 4-part, 16-minute music video yet? If not, you’ll probably want to fix that.
- “I bleached my arms for a while. But then it grows back in and you have this weird Mohawk situation of arm hair.” An in-depth conversation that gets real on shaving and not shaving, and what it all means.
- Last week, there was a pearl-clutching Vanity Fair article on Tinder and “the end of dating”, which featured some truly repellent humans (“In his iPhone, he has a list of more than 40 girls he has “had relations with, rated by [one to five] stars…. It empowers them,” he jokes. “It’s a mix of how good they are in bed and how attractive they are”). Luckily, Moira Weigel is here to remind us “every generation has thought that the next generation was dating wrong”, and that moral panics about the changes technology makes in courtship have been around for 100+ years. She effectively deconstructs the arguments of the VF piece: “If we are to believe the evolutionary psychologists she cites, our genders have stable essences that were fixed tens of thousands of years ago; however, for all that time men have been waiting for the latest iPhone roll out so they could really realize their natural desires.”
- Amandla Stenberg proves that the kids are just fine
- “When women see me, they’re trying to protect this category they belong to. Women practice patriarchy every day”: a video on the pain and empowerment of choosing your own gender
- Cleo’s new issue on Camp is here, and it’s amazing! You could start with the roundtable on sex at summer camp.
- Gorgeous writing on black soap, ‘nigga’, and becoming African-American
- “Getting angry works for Black women — it gets results and keeps us alive.” Also from the New Inquiry, She Mad and She Magic, on the productive anger of Black women.
- Canadian sex workers on what their jobs are really like
- How to accept kindness (one trick: give it!)
- What’s the word for when you’re laughing and crying at the same time? After Target announced it would stop segregating its children’s toys by gender, a man posed as Target customer support on Facebook to fuck with the grown adults who were very very mad about the decision.
- Talking about Drake, “do it from where you’re at!”, and being a hip-hop artist in Toronto.
- “Step 13: Fan the grains into the air, allowing the wind to winnow the chaff harmlessly away.” How to Menstruate
- “Are we ready to listen? When will we be brave enough to act?” On environmental destruction and the Colorado River.
- What does white supremacy culture look like in action?
- “Most days, we (my father, sister, and I) didn’t know what would trigger her. She wasn’t cunning or evil–she was disarming in her innocence. So tender, and yet fraught with tension, like a rubber band around a razor. For this reason alone, I have, and always, always, always will be at the behest of my mother.” Living with a mother with mental illness
- Roosh V, an anti-feminist pickup artist and a real asshole who wants to legalize rape, is facing organized resistance to his seminars in Toronto and Montreal.
- Why aren’t the federal leaders ready to debate gender equality?
- A perfect pep talk generator to bookmark for when you need it
- This was a great week on the GUTS blog! We had a beautiful long essay on breastfeeding, desire, and hunger; poignant advice on moving and coming out to your parents from bb, and some rules for your baby shower. Catch up now!
- Last but not least: this week marks GUTS’ second birthday! We are proud of what we’ve done, and so so grateful to every single one of our writers, artists, editors, readers and supporters for their contributions. There is no way we could do it without you. Thank you all, and we’re excited for the next steps – join us!