Latest Articles

Preacher's Daughter: Sexual Violence and Discourses of “Purity”

by Kristin Rawls
October 27, 2011 at 11:25am

I have spent a lot of time thinking about the silliness of “True Love Waits”-style campaigns, but it never really occurred to me to think about how a child who has been raped might experience these shaming “abstinence-only” discourses. That is to say, this would be particularly cruel, painful, and potentially traumatic for such a child.

Potentially even worse than teen purity rallies, I...

Douchebag Decree: ChapStick: It's On Everyone's Lips (When They Are Talking About D-bags)

by Ann-Derrick Gaillot
October 27, 2011 at 10:55am

Not only does the ad offensively use women’s bodies to sell a product it, also needlessly sexualizes a non-sexual product. It’s ChapStick for god’s sake! And now I have to think of this lady’s ass every time I rub it on my lips? What? I didn’t want that!

Bringing Up Baby: The Traumatic Birth Scenes of Ye Olden Days

by Katherine Don
October 26, 2011 at 12:49pm

Nothing instills a fear of pregnancy more than watching childbirth scenes that take place during the Medieval period.. or the Renaissance… or during the Enlightenment… or any time, really, before the twentieth century. Screaming mistresses/courtesans/queens/princesses lay flushed in their canopied doily beds as frantic women flutter about the room, dipping cloths in hot water....

BiblioBitch: Dorianne Laux and the Poetry of the Everyday

by Katie Presley
October 26, 2011 at 12:16pm

Dorianne Laux’s fifth book of poetry, The Book of Men, was released earlier this year. Spoiler alert: It is NOT ACTUALLY A BOOK OF MEN. It is a book of earth, and sex, and war, and food, and even a book of Cher. Yep. Cher. After reading The Book of Men I immersed myself in Laux’s other books, and have emerged remembering what is best about reading poems....

The H-Word: Q & A with Tits and Sass!

by Melissa Petro
October 26, 2011 at 11:30am

Tits and Sass is a blog written and run by sex workers who saw a void when it came to a smart, witty response to the public image of the sex industry.  The ideas promoted about sex workers in the public eye have as much an impact on the realities of the lives of sex workers as the law. For this reason, one of the site’s co-creators, Charlotte, says, “we’re not letting any more...

Isn't He Lovely: The Trouble with “Machismo”

by Cristen Conger
October 26, 2011 at 11:01am

Earlier this year, the Los Angeles Times reported on the hottest new marketing demographic for the personal care industry: Latino men. Considering that Hispanics are the fastest-growing ethnic group in the United States, it isn’t surprising that brands and advertisers had already begun courting Latina women’s purchasing preferences. The men’s habits, however, seemed...

Don't Mess Up When You Dress Up: Cultural Appropriation and Costumes

by Kjerstin Johnson
October 25, 2011 at 1:22pm

Halloween is a notorious time for offensive outfits. If you’re still not sure what your costume is going to be this year, make sure you don’t go the culturally appropriative route. Dressing up as “another culture,” is racist, and an act of privilege. Fortunately, thanks to some college students behind Students Teaching About Racism in Society (STARS), an Ohio University...

B-Sides: Shredding 101

by Mac Pogue
October 25, 2011 at 12:54pm

Sometimes I wonder what I did to deserve the amount of ridiculously awesome music here in Portland, Oregon. Earlier this year we had the Females of Color Festival, a celebration of anyone that plays music and identifies as a female of color (the lineup included, um, pretty much every great band in this town), and this last weekend saw the passing of Shred Fest, a festival for face...

Preacher's Daughter: What Evangelical Christians Mean When They Say...

by Kristin Rawls
October 25, 2011 at 12:36pm

Last week, a friend sent me a link to the blog Stuff Christian Culture Likes. Not to be confused with the evangelical site, Stuff Christians Like, Stuff Christian Culture Likes zeroes in on the strangeness of US evangelicalism with a more jaded perspective.

The blog raises an issue that I’ve been thinking about a lot recently—that is, that evangelicalism has its own weird...

Why Aren't You Married? Answer Coming Soon to ABC!

by Kelsey Wallace
October 25, 2011 at 10:42am

Ugh. Remember Tracy McMillan’s Huffington Post article from earlier this year, “Why You’re Not Married”? The one that was designed to piss you off and calls unmarried women shallow, slutty, selfish lying bitches who aren’t good enough? Yeah. Well not only did someone at Random House find it so compelling they’re turning it into a book, now it’s an ABC...

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