A perfect quote.
10 Aug 2010 Leave a Comment
“Do you not think that the problem might come from the very fact that you are angry at us for complaining, rather than angry at your fellow boys and men for this enduring misogyny? Instead of being furious that we point out that many men do act this way – including men these women trust completely – be angry that there are men that will treat your mother, sister, daughter, friend, girlfriend badly purely because they are female. Not only that but they are giving you a bad name, not us.”
Replace men-related stuff with “feminists”, “misogyny” with “bigotry”, and women-related stuff with “[marginalized group]” and it’s the same thing as this.
via Feminist Disavowal Of Cissexism « Genderbitch: Musings of a Trans Chick.
I’ve copied this here just so I can access this easily if/when needed. It’s from comment 3 on that post, and the commenter references genderqueer on tumblr as the source and it’s so perfect. Just a wonderful sentiment.
Unemployment and JSA
09 Aug 2010 Leave a Comment
I’ve been a lazy blogger, I have got a couple of posts percolating and have a new project which I’m going to try and launch proper this week. We’ll see how it goes.
I’ve mostly been unemployed since leaving uni. There’s been a couple of fantastic jobs that I’ve been passed over for or have been withdrawn which has been quite depressing. But I keep on, applied for a pharmacy dispensing job today, which would be perfect for me in every way – temporary (finishes March next year), full time, NVQ training. So, fingers crossed for that.
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‘Real’ women and ‘real’ beauty
02 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Cynicism, Entertainment, Women
Witch.Wordswrote a blog post regarding Doves casting call for a ‘Real Beauty’ photo session in NY. Here is the casting call:
Glee and Beauty
27 May 2010 2 Comments
I don’t watch Glee. I’ve listened to the music and quite like it. From what I’ve seen during the adverts they vastly under-use some of the voices at their disposal but that’s mostly subjective I feel.
Required background knowledge: Glee club is a non-religious choir-type group singing, with melodies and harmonies etc. One of the cast members (the only PoC in the group I believe, but I may be wrong) is a fat black girl. She is a confident, bubbly young woman with a fantastic strong voice. Seriously, it pours out of her like vomit. Awesome, musical vomit, but I’m sure you get the picture.
The thing I want to discuss is an advert I saw recently. The group was at some sporting event as cheerleaders (it was indoors – basketball? Unimportant, anyway) and the aforementioned girl was singing Beautiful by Christina Aguilera. For those who don’t know, the song is about inner beauty, I guess, and feeling beautiful despite other’s opinions. For example, the chorus:
I am beautiful no matter what they say
Words can’t bring me down
I am beautiful in every single way
Yes, words can’t bring me down, oh no
So don’t you bring me down today
Now, yes this song sends a powerful message of self-worth and confidence and self-acceptance. And from what I’ve seen of the adverts, she is a confident lady who is comfortable with herself. But I can’t help but feel cynical about why she was chosen to sing this song.
Is it another: fat women – especially fat women of colour can’t possibly be found to be beautiful by ‘conventional’ means. She must feel beautiful despite what others say because no one would ever findher beautiful.
I must admit I always find myself worrying if I’m reading too much into things when I find fat hating, racist, misogynistic messages in entertainment, but this message seems so obvious without being overtly hateful at the same time.
It’s times like this that remind me how we’re swimming in this kind of imagery. And its disturbing to say the least.
UK Election 2010
07 May 2010 Leave a Comment
in Politics
So, the results are almost in, and it’s a hung parliament. It’s been an interesting one, from the TV debates to the media to the utter disgrace of the disenfrachisement of voters. I’ll put a jump here, as this seems the best place to put it, and the post is going to be fairly epic. More
Blog Note
20 Apr 2010 Leave a Comment
in Blog
Just moved this blog across to a WordPress domain ( http://blueeyed1987.wordpress.com). Will be setting up a redirect from the old to the new at somepoint during the week.
Don’t judge my family
20 Apr 2010 Leave a Comment
in Politics
http://www.dontjudgemyfamily.com/home/Home.html
The Election campaign is in full swing over here in the UK. I’m personally rooting for the LibDems, and live in a LibDem constituency, although it’s a marginal seat with Plaid Cymru in second. But this is mainly background. What I want to talk about is a piece of legislation that the Conservative party have pleged if they get into power.
It’s a Marriage Tax Break. More
Ramble warning: Death
26 Mar 2010 Leave a Comment
in Random
This has been sitting in my drafts for a while, finally decided to post it.
So, for some unknown reason, I started to comtemplate death this evening. I was doing a silly Facebook quiz, an they asked the: ‘Where do you see yourself in 10 years?’ and my thoughts flicked through my hypothetical life, as you do. And then death came up, because it will. It’s one of the hypotheticals.
I don’t normally think about it, to be honest. What’s the point when there are lots of different beliefs, but no stories of experiences? May as well wait and see. And, I’d rather think about living, it’s quite complicated at times. As the great philosopher Robbie Williams said: I’m not scared of dying, I just don’t want to.
But my mind tried to go there and hit a brick wall. And it felt odd. Trying to comprehend a time where there would be no me…I can’t do it, because I’m trying to imagine a time where, in theory, I won’t be able to imagine anything. Will I be able to feel like what’s it’s like to be dead? The scientist part of me wants to be able to, even just temporarily, even though I won’t be able to tell anyone what it’s like. But that’s the same part that knows it’s probably impossible-once I’m brain dead, I won’t be able to comprehend anything. I certainly won’t be able to process any sensory information.
I’m not sure if I want there to be an afterlife or not. I can only imagine you’d be tired of existing after a while…especially without a body. But the idea of not being also makes me feel slightly queasy. I actually quite like my mind, I like living in it most of the time. The idea of not having it irritates me. But of course, I probably wouldn’t be able to use it if I did have it. And then what is the afterlife, if there is one? Who’s vision? Just what, why? Would I want to live in a utopia? How would it be an utopia if I’ve left people behind, who are living?
I’m too sober for this shit.
Ada Lovelace day
24 Mar 2010 Leave a Comment
I really wanted to write a post for Ada Lovelace day: http://findingada.com/
However, my dissertation and other uni work is taking up far too much time, maybe I’ll write a belated one next week when (in theory) I should have some down time.
Dissertation
14 Mar 2010 Leave a Comment
in Uni
My dissertation has pretty much taken up my entire life. If I’m not in lectures I’m in the lab. If I’m not there, I’m writing my diss, and keeping up with other assignments. My diss is currently at 2,464/7,500. I should be up to 3,000 tomorrow, and then I need to wait until I get some results to discuss. The chances of me getting any decent results are nil at this point-unless a miracle haapens this week. I need to talk to my supervisor about it.
I have to give a talk on my diss, which I’m dreading. I fecked this project up, really. If I’d have checked the PCR program sooner, (admittedly, there were other people around who could also have doen the same) then I would’ve known it was set up wrongly and fixed it sooner, thus giving me more time to work on the other stuff. But that’s all in the past now. I just have to focus on this week, and trying to get a decent first draft of my diss hopefully written before I break up for Easter (roughly two weeks).
Tomorrow I need to: PCR and run out on a gel. Purify PCR. Run on gel again to ensure I’m not fecking up. Transform into E. coli. Plate out and hope for the best. PCR will take ~3 hours, gel ~50mins, purify ~40mins, gel ~50mins, tranformation ~3 hours, then incubate overnight. Not looking forward to 8 hours in the lab, but hopefully the breaks will give me time to write some more diss 
Plus Mark is going to meet me for a bit so that will be good.
