hey there, i'm currently working on a feminist website and i'm looking for the help of other women to give their feedback, their opinions, and advice/expertise. the site is not published yet but it is in the development stage, and i would really like as much help as i can get as i have big plans for it and what it sets out to accomplish.

this is a website that aims to promote activism, raise class consciousness, support women of all backgrounds, organize events, share resources, and build community. there is a serious lack of infrastructure in feminist spaces and having us all shouting into the void on social media is antithetical to true feminist action. this website aims to act as a hub for ALL the wonderful resources the women on here post on their blogs, for ease-of-access and the sake of decentralization. this website also seeks to mitigate the amount of discourse and in-fighting within the community in favor of encouraging direct action, change, and connection.

please interact with this post or send me a message if you:

are tired of social media interfaces and would be interested in meeting with other feminists, online and in-person

create feminist art, zines, music, media, graphics, etc.

would be interested in participating in or conducting a workshop for feminist consciousness raising or skill building

know back-end coding

would be interested in contributing whatever you can to a project like this

do not hesitate to ask questions about the project, and reblogs for visibility are very much appreciated.

thanks for reading!

I've said it before and I'll say it again

ONLY TIP FEMALE SERVICE WORKERS!

We NEED to keep as much money as possible in female pockets. If you tip a woman, that's more money in a woman's pocket! If you don't tip a man, that's more money in another woman's (YOUR) pocket!!

Males don't need our charity! Let them be broke! Don't feel bad about it, he doesn't feel bad when he goes home and jerks off to the paid rape of our half of the population.

Hey Gyns!

I’m sure we’ve all seen a ton of posts asking about how to actually do the on the ground feminist work in our communities, so here is something I’d like to share with y’all that will help you do exactly that.

It’s called The Pad Project. They began in 2013, originally to create a documentary about period poverty in a village in India, but they quickly grew into a worldwide organization to help educate about menstruation and provide women and girls access to period products. They offer a ton of ways to help your community fight period poverty with their Pad Project Toolkit which the screenshots below are taken from. To download the toolkit you can go to their Take Action page and click on the link.

I’ve been donating to them for some time now and I really wanted to do more, which is how I ended up discovering the Toolkit and signed up to be a fundraiser for their BacktoSchool campaign. It’s a U.S campaign to provide girls here in the States period products for the upcoming school year. They also have international campaigns to help raise money for Afghan girls to attend school which I absolutely love. If you go to their donation page it will show all the campaigns you can donate to. $100 will support 25 U.S girls for an entire school year. $290 will help a woman in Afghanistan through an entire year of university and $1,200 will support her throughout undergrad. Other ways you can help in your own community are period product drives and hosting a screening to watch the documentary (this last one is also a good way to connect with other feminists in your community!)

I’ll of course be putting a link down below and will be posting something later about my fundraiser so that you can donate if you are able to. If you want to become a fundraiser as well, there is a link on the donation page that will send you to GiveSmart.com. Al it asks for is your name and an email address. You can then post your fundraiser on your socials and have people text the number to donate :)

Georgina Agnes Brackenbury, Emmeline Pankhurst, 1927

Olive Edis, Emmeline Pankhurst, 1920s

Olive Edis, Emmeline Pankhurst, ca. 1920s

Emmeline Pankhurst (née Goulden; 15 July 1858 – 14 June 1928) British political activist who, with her daughters, organised the United Kingdom’s suffrage movement and helped UK women claim their right to vote.

“Feminist Action”

This week’s theme is “Methods of Managing the Psychological Impact of Misogyny/Feminism”

I wanted academic sources on what the psychological impacts of misogyny were, even if they seemed obvious.  I started by looking for studies on the effects of living in fear of male violence, but with no luck. I found several sources on the intersection of psychology and misogyny, but they were too broad or unrelated. However, I started to notice trends in the sources I read.

This review (1) of the history of Positive Psychology explained how it enforces the American Dream, the nuclear family, and conservative values.  The field was male-dominated, and it was used to silence second wave feminists. For example, Phyllis Schlafly argued that if housewives were unhappy, it was because they didn’t have the right frame of mind. According to positive psychology, morals are universal, so it’s used to argue that gender roles are innate. Feminists who argued that being a housewife was oppressive were seen as having an unnatural worldview.

Another review (2) defined a type of trolling called “Gendertrolling,” which is used to silence women.  It’s different from other types of trolling in that it can last for years, spans multiple platforms (and real life), and is usually conducted by several people. For example, Rebecca Watson was asked to speak at an atheism conference on how to attract more women to the movement.  After the conference, a man she had never met got in the elevator with her and asked her up to his hotel room for “coffee” at about 4 am.  In a video, she treated it like a lighthearted story and said “Guys, don’t do that” with a laugh.  She received rape and death threats and men posted graphic photos of corpses on her Facebook page.  The campaign is ongoing.  The paper argued that this is a silencing tactic used against women who speak up against misogyny, or sometimes just speak up in a male-dominated industry.

In all of the papers I read, the common trend was silencing.  Women voiced their opinions, often about sexism, and men banded together to intimidate or gaslight them. None of the sources adequately addressed how to combat these tactics, but since the weekly topic is managing the effects of misogyny I thought I’d suggest a few.

1. We have to speak up.  The point of these campaigns is to silence us, but we must remember that if we weren’t a threat they wouldn’t bother. Speaking up allows other women to recognize and combat misogyny.  It also shows men that this behavior won’t be tolerated.

2. Support other women.  Some of the victims of gender trolling felt overwhelmed by the hundreds of rape and death threats they received.  It made them feel like everyone was against them.  We need to show that women who speak up will be supported, even if we can’t drown out the violent threats.

These two aren’t mutually exclusive.  The more women who speak up, the easier it will be to connect with one another.  The more we connect with one another, the more we will recognize and call out misogyny in our lives.

Sources

1.   McElya, M. (n.d.). JUST WEAR YOUR SMILE: THE GENDER POLITICS OF POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY. 21.  

2.   Mantilla, K. (2013). Gendertrolling: Misogyny Adapts to New Media. 9.  

3. Stark, C. A. (2019). Gaslighting, Misogyny, and Psychological Oppression. The Monist, 102(2), 221–235. https://doi.org/10.1093/monist/onz007  

4. Dworkin, E. R., & Weaver, T. L. (2021). The impact of sociocultural contexts on mental health following sexual violence: A conceptual model. Psychology of Violence, 11(5), 476–487. https://doi.org/10.1037/vio0000350  

Note: I only reference the first two sources, but the others were part of my research. I did not think they were as relevant to this topic, but I still found them useful.

Feminist action is

When your pregnant friend is too tired to attend the women's group, you set up your laptop, make a place setting, and let her attend virtually instead of just leaving her out.

It's a bold new world, y'all. Pregnant women aren't second class citizens.

"No climate justice on occupied land"

"Making #HERstory

She wasn’t kicked out of Eden - She WALKED out” ©️ ;

Cali Lili

#SustainableMovies™️ #mybodymychoice #AllFemaleCrew #BLM #LGBTQ #ClimateAction eVe N’ god this female is not yet rated ™☯️ #innovator ; #IndieAuteur

Do you know what would help with girls and women identifying as trans due to over sexualisation of their bodies…? The widespread availability of gender neutral, non-sexualised clothes. They should be sustainable, cheap and easy to get.

This should be something that feminism focuses on. Right now the only way to get non-sexualised clothing is to wear men’s clothes or find gender neutral clothing. Only one of those options are built for the female body.

where do you recommend putting the stickers? i'm worried about being caught for vandalism

This is a good question! My suggestions, in no particular order:

In general, wear nondescript clothing, sticker outside when it's dark or not too busy, look out for cameras and signs that say areas and under surveillance, and try to sticker on public property over private property

Most people are not scrutinizing your behavior, memorizing your face and clothing, or paying attention to what you're doing. I've placed hundreds of stickers by keeping them in my bag or pocket, looking for where to place them, picking a spot when I'm 50 feet away, casually peeling off the backing and putting it in my pocket (don't litter the sticker backings, please!), doing a quick look around to see who's near, then slapping the sticker on my target. When stickering in public places, make sure you minimize blind spots (opaque doors that can suddenly open, corners someone can walk around, etc.)

Look for where stickers and graffiti already are and where stickers and graffiti persist (remain for long periods of time) and sticker in those spots. Chances are they'll stay up longer.

Private, women's only spaces like general public bathrooms, bathrooms in restaurants or bars, and changing rooms are great for stickering! It's just you in there and no cameras so you don't have to worry about being caught as much. Bathrooms where there's lots of graffiti/stickers are the best because you don't have to worry about inconveniencing anyone who might have to clean up your sticker (if there are hundreds of stickers on this dive bar bathroom wall nobody will care if you put another). You can sticker on the door handle above the lock, on the mirror, on the soap or paper towel dispenser, on the toilet seat dispenser, next to any signage... wherever you think people will see the sticker!

Try to place your stickers at eye level or next to something people stop to look at or interact with. That could be on a lamp post at eye level, a crosswalk button, a parking meter, a bus stop sign, road signs, bike racks... any public infrastructure that's eye level or people stop to look at or interact with! Bonus points if there's already graffiti or stickers: nobody will care if you add more.

If you place your stickers way above eye level (ex: a STOP sign), they'll be a bit harder to read but also harder to tear down or get rid of. Whereever you place them, make sure the stickers can be read by a woman (or person) of average height. Unless it's next to something they'll interact with or are inclined to look at (a sign, a door handle, a button), stickers that are too low or high might not get seen.

Think of the weather conditions, the texture of the surface you're stickering, and how much foot traffic that area gets. These all factor into how long your sticker stays up and how many people will see it.

Sometimes stickers get torn down. Don't get discouraged! It means someone read that sticker :) Some of my stickers get peeled off but the majority of them stay! And a faded sticker from being left in the sun and rain for months just means you can sticker a new one.

We need climate action.

Digital illustration of a blonde woman wearing a mask facing the New York City skyline. She is standing on a fire-escape wearing a tan dress that reads, ‘climate change is a public health crisis.’

Sylvia Pankhurst, by Sylvia Pankhurst, chalk, circa 1907-1910

Sylvia Pankhurst, by Herbert Cole, chalk. circa 1925

Sylvia Pankhurst, by Bassano Ltd, bromide print, 25 February 1927

Estelle Sylvia Pankhurst (5 May 1882 – 27 September 1960) English feminist and socialist activist and writer. With her mother and sister, she was a leader in the suffrage movement, helping women in the UK claim their right to the vote.

Given the pervasive character of the violence women are confronting, it is clear that resistance to it must also be organized on many fronts. Mobilizations are already underway, increasingly shunning dead-end solutions, such as demanding more punitive legislation, which only serves to give more power to the very authorities that are directly or indirectly responsible for the problem. More effective are the strategies that women devise when they take things in their hands. Particulalry successful tactics are opening shelters controlled not by the authorities but by the women who use them, organizing self-defense classes, and building broadly inclusive demonstrations like the Take Back the Night marches that originated in the 1970s or the marches organized by women in India against rape and dowry murders, which often led to sit-ins in the neighborhoods of the perpetrators on in front of police stations. In recent years we have also seen the rise of anti-witch hunt campaings in both Africa and India, with women and men going from village to village, educating people about the causes of illness and the interests motivating male traditional healers, local leaders, and other frequent accusers. In some areas of Guatemala, women have begun taking the names of abusive soldiers and exposing them in their villages of origin. In each case, women's decision to fight back, break their isolation, and join with other women have been vital for the success of these efforts. But these strategies cannot produce lasting change if they are not accompanied by a process of revaluation of the position of women and of the reproductive activities they contribute to their families and communities, and such cannot be affected unless women acquire the resources they need to be independent of men, so that they cannot be forced, for the sake of survival, to accept dangerous and exploitative conditions of work and familial relations."

Federici, Silvia. Witches, Witch-Hunting, and Women. PM Press, 2018.

the rhetoric that its easier for het women to just be celibate for life than it is for them to do something significantly smaller like give up makeup or stop shaving is.. quite strange and disconnected. like if we want to argue it is possible for het women to give up men & not be with men, i agree. if we want to argue its possible for het women to have happy, fulfilling lives without men, i agree. i don't even disagree with the argument that being a separatist is a crucial aspect of being a radical feminist. but we can argue all of these things without pretending like certain acts are easier than they are. for some women, even giving up makeup is not easy. but at the end of the day, no its not easy to commit to something like never having a romantic & sexual partner for the rest of your life!! like!! feminism and radical actions are not easy, they can be easy for some of us but its not easy overall & pretending like its a small little sacrifice just seems ridiculous