Thank you Gradient Lair. I will miss you.

I wrote this piece on Thursday to publish today as part of my Silent Sunday round-up of inspiring blogs written by women. Gradient Lair's hiatus is over but I'm still going to publish this post because, well, I want to. Gradient Lair is one of the best blogs I have ever written and I was genuinely sad that I would not get to read something by this amazing blogger for a while. Women's voices need to be celebrated:


The Gradient Lair blog is now on haitus. It has only been going for a year but has been an incredible source of inspiration to me. I will miss it tremendously.

These are some of my favourite pieces from Gradient Lair:

The Truth about Media, Police and Prison

Corporate America Hates Me and I Hate It

Demanding Flattery is an Oppressors Tool

Womanism/ Black Feminism and Race in Feminist Discourse

Examining White Supremacy and Heroism: When Both White and Black People Value White Lives More

I hate Night Clubs (They feel like street harassment to music)

Why Whites Call People of Colour Racist

White Men Who Write about White Privilege

The Beauty Binary, Street Harassment and Rape Culture

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Taking the Fight to the Bank: Join us on Friday!

[Reblogged from WeekWoman]

What a couple of weeks it’s been!

We not only reached, but have actually passed our fundraising target of £13,000, which means we are now in a position to take the Bank of England to court if they continue to refuse to take equality into account when deciding who features on our banknotes. Following on from the letter signed by 46 Labour MPs and peers, we’ve had both Maria Miller and Ed Miliband come out in support of our campaign – we even had Mervyn King backed so far into a corner on the issue that he was forced to name the ‘contingency candidate’ he previously refused to reveal, citing what we must now consider to be spurious security concerns.

And now Mark Carney has used his first public statement as Governor of the Bank of England to address the #banknotes issue. This is fantastic; but it is by no means the end. We still have no firm guarantee that women will remain on banknotes. We also have no firm guarantee about the Bank’s future public decisions being made under the auspices of the Equality Act. Until we have these, the fight continues. (My full statement can be found here)

And our first step is to START THINKING about an outfit! At 11am on Friday, we will be gathering outside the Bank of England to hand in the petition signed by over 30,000 people, dressed as our favourite women from history. It should be a great day and a wonderful opportunity to highlight the wealth of choice the Bank has when it comes to choosing women for our banknotes. Fancy dress is optional, but any nods you can make to your favoured candidate would be great! I will be there at 11 sharp, along with my puppy adorned with a suffrage sash – I look forward to seeing as many of you there as possible! Feel free to bring friends etc along – it would be brilliant to have a really strong showing there to demonstrate to the Bank the strength of feeling on this issue. I realise that since many of you don’t live in London you won’t be able to make it, but I have plans for this too! If you can’t make the protest, please take a picture of yourself dressed as your favourite female historical character and tweet it @bankofengland under the hashtag #WomenonBanknotes – make sure they have us coming at them from all angles! But if you possibly can find a way to make the demonstration, even if only very briefly at the beginning, it would be hugely appreciated.

Look forward to meeting loads of amazing women from history very soon!

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Feminist Art Club: Help a Sister Out

M.K. Hajdin, who blogs as Exiled Stardust, has started a Feminist Art Club. Basically, those who can afford to help purchase art supplies then get a piece of feminist art in exchange or you can donate to help another feminist acquire a piece of Hajdin's art. I love this idea as a form of feminist activism; subverting capitalism by helping other feminists: 

Join my art club 

Like art?  Think you’ll never be able to afford any because it’s too expensive? 

Why not join my Twitter Feminist Art Club? 

It’s simple.  Follow me on Twitter and either donate things I need to make art or money to buy them with, get artwork in return or you can contribute to help another feminist acquire a piece of art.
It’s basically artistic socialism. 

I live on a very low income and everything helps, so if you like my site and want to support the cause  and/or help keep my cats fed. 

You can donate here. 

In the interests of full disclosure, this is the beginnings of my painting: 

I am very, very excited. 

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Silent Sunday: Inspiring Blogs!

It's not slut-shaming. It's woman-hating at Feminist Current

System Fail at From A Whisper To A Roar

The Truth about Media, Police and Prison at Gradient Lair

The WHO Stats Tell Us the Extent of VAW at Sianandcrookedrib

Your Vagina is Still Not a Car at From A Whisper to a Roar

Male Violence. Not Gender Based Violence at Sisterhood is Powerful

Everyday Victim Blaming: Am I Victim Enough for you? at Portia Smart

Malespeak with Radical Feminist Translation at Medusa's Gaze

Authoritah at Femonade

The Coalition government and broadening the fight to end violence against women and girls beyond the Criminal Justice System by Karen Ingala Smith

Corporate America Hates Me and I Hate It at Gradient Lair

And just for Caroline, even though The Women's Room UK already reached their target of £13 000 to mount a legal challenge to the Bank of England's decision to remove the only woman on English money who go there by personal achievement instead of an accident of birth: We're Running out of Time. Help Spread the Word and See Justice Done.

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​Don't let the Bank of England buy their way out of justice! Help spread the word!

Below is a letter written by Caroline Criado-Perez of The Woman's Room UK asking for financial support in challenging the Bank of England's decision to remove the only woman from our bank notes to replace her with yet another man [and, yes, we know the Queen is on the bill. If you don't understand why the Queen doesn't count, well, there's not much I can do to help you filter through the patriarchal bullshit].

WE ARE RUNNING OUT OF TIME! Please copy and paste this letter and send it to all your friends and colleagues; if you are at university as a student or academic, please ask your Woman's Officer to send it round. We need to spread the word as far, wide and fast as possible if we are going to stop the Bank of England evading justice! 

Feel free to adapt it if you think it can be shorter - it is written with people who haven't heard of the campaign before in mind.

Suggested Subject: Please read this in full: it's important to me.

OR: ​Don't let the Bank of England buy their way out of justice! Help spread the word!

Dear [xxxxx]

I am getting in touch to ask for your help. Nearly two months ago, the Bank of England announced a new figure for our paper currency. That person was Churchill. What they did not mention in the long speeches they made at the time about the 'gilded list' that he was joining and the 'uniquely privileged position' they were in to be able to 'promote our shared cultural heritage', was that Churchill would be replacing the only female historical figure on our banknotes. This means that our banknotes will exclusively feature white men.

This matters. It matters because we still live in a culture where women's achievements are routinely undermined and erased - you only need to look at the paltry representation of women in our new history curriculum to see this in action. It matters because a growing and compelling field of research on role models shows how much impact they have on young women - including a negative impact where they are absent. And it matters because, as the Bank of England themselves say, the choice of figures on our banknotes promotes a shared cultural heritage - and what does it say about us as a country if we see that heritage as exclusively white and male?

This is why it matters - and this is what I am doing about it. To date, more than 28000 people have signed a petition, asking the Bank of England to reverse their decision to remove the only woman on our banknotes and replace her with yet another man. In response, the Governor of the Bank of England, Sir Mervyn King informed us that 'with respect', the Queen is on the notes, thereby completely evading the conversation we are having about merit rather than inherited privilege, and also demonstrating that, far from respecting the 28000 people who had signed the petition, he had not even read it, since the issue of the Queen is addressed there.

In a more concerning move, he also said that he was 'sure' that all people 'would' have been treated equally, despite the fact that at this point, the Bank of England had already been sent a legal letter arguing that they were in breach of the 2010 Equality Act, which is not satisfied with conditionals such as 'sure' and 'would'; on the contrary, it requires Mervyn King himself to know that he has paid due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination and promote equality. In line with King's own comment, the Bank's formal response also demonstrated a lack of understanding of their duty under the Equality Act. They claimed that the duty is not engaged, but also claimed that they had complied with it; considering the positive action required under the Act it is arguable that it is possible to fulfil the duties of the Act while at the same time thinking they are not engaged. They also refused to provide any documentation regarding the decision-making process,  calling it a 'fishing expedition' - this despite the fact that the Equality Act explicitly refers to the decision-making process, meaning that evidence of how a decision was taken is paramount to demonstrating compliance. Finally, they completely changed their tone about the the significance of the people on banknotes - no longer a 'gilded list', it was an irrelevance which 'prominent dead person' replaced another.

I do not want to take the Bank of England to court. I simply want them to recognise their duties under the Equality Act - indeed a very easy way out is open to them, since Darwin is in fact an older note than Fry and therefore is due a change anyway. However, the Bank is not taking this option. Instead they are throwing all the public funds they have at their disposal into defending the decision not to have a single woman on our banknotes; their solicitors are as expensive as they come. This is without doubt a David and Goliath situation, but I do not believe that the Bank should be able to buy their way out of justice. There is no doubt that the Bank is big, powerful and rich. But what we lack in funds, we make up for in strength of numbers. We only need 671 people to donate £10 to reach our target - but time is running out. We only have until the 24th of June to make our target amount. Please help us get there: forward this email on to all your friends; tweet about the petition; share it on facebook; and please donate whatever you can to help us see justice done.

I believe we can get there, but it requires us all to pull together and stand firm against inequality and injustice. This may be a small thing, but small things add up to a toxic culture in which women are routinely discriminated against. Let's not let the small things slide.

Thank you so much for your support.

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TWR & The Feminists can campaign about more than One Thing at a time Shocker

I am so bored of the concerted attacks on The Women's Room UK and the obsession of supposed 'feminists' with denigrating one form of feminist activism as not important enough. 

The women behind The Women's Room UK aren't fucking stupid. They know their campaign to increase women's visibility in the media by destroying cultural femicide isn't the only form of feminist activism.

They know that there are literally millions of other feminist campaigns which have nothing to do with cultural femicide.

They know that having women on banknotes for their accomplishments rather than an accident of birth is a small step towards patriarchal destruction.

They also know that small steps are as important as the big steps.

How about we stop wasting time having tantrums on twitter about one campaign and actually start focussing on destroying the patriarchy?


The campaign to keep women on English banknotes for their accomplishments rather than an accident of birth is here.

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This week in Missing the Point Completely: Maria Miller and the WBC

According to the Guardian, Maria Miller has come up with yet another completely pointless but expensive program to deal with The Problem of Girls. This time she's got the Women's Business Council, which was only set up last year, making recommendations which demonstrate just how out of touch they all are with the reality of the lives of girls who aren't white and born to wealthy, well-educated parents. Miller is going to produce information packs to teach parents of girls how to bring up "aspirational" daughters. You see, the only reason that the number of women in the upper echelons of management and on FTSE 100 boards is because girls lack "aspiration".

It has absolutely nothing to do with systemic oppression which privileges boys over girls from the start of their lives. 

It has nothing to do with educational practise which favours boys.

It has nothing to do with girls being socialised to defer to boys their whole lives.

It has nothing to do with girls being taught that having an opinion or being intelligent doesn't count unless they pass the Patriarchal Fuckability Test.

It has nothing to do with sexist hiring practises. 

It has nothing to do with the fact that women are penalised for being mothers before actually being mothers [and the assumption that all women want to be mothers].

It has nothing to do with poverty or class or race or disability. 

The Fawcett Society has clearly been blithering on about absolutely nothing for years.

The only problem girls have is a lack of aspiration. We know this because a bunch of well-educated, mostly white women who are very privileged have gotten together to say so.

I could rant for hours about Miller's complete lack of understanding of the reality of the lives of most girls in the UK. Government policies to encourage FTSE 100 companies to have a minimum of 25% women on their boards won't change anything if the vast majority of girls in the UK are being left behind for no other reason than not being born to privileged parents.

There are two things that will increase girls "aspirations":

1. The Welfare State
2. Feminism

That is it. We need a fully functioning welfare state which supports everyone. We need universal and affordable child care. We need a social care network which helps care for family members who are disabled or elderly. We need a culture where men do 50% of the childcare and the housework. We need a culture where women's choices are supported and not used as a stick to beat them with.

We don't need information packs to teach parents how to raise "aspirational girls". Our girls are already aspirational. We need nothing less than a complete destruction of the capitalist-patriarchy so that our girls can grow up to be who they want to be without being pilloried, insulted and denigrated.

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Reading the Comments as Feminist Activism?

I never read the comments under articles. They are almost entirely hate-filled bile spewed by MREs with serious personality disorders. The Guardian is one of the worst offenders for refusing to delete violent and misogynistic abuse. Frankly, it frightens me. So when I came across this piece by Week Woman, I was genuinely flabbergasted. It's a well known feminist truism that you never ever read the comments, yet Week Woman is not only arguing that we read the comments but that we start reclaiming them as a space for feminist activism. The male trolls on Mumsnet annoy me enough as it is, I can't imagine wanting to spend any time on the Guardian website posting comments that will inevitably result in a bunch of arsenuggets making violent, offensive and threatening responses. 

However, Week woman's blog reminded me of a story feminist writer Bidisha told at a UK Feminista Summer School several years ago. Basically, Bidisha claimed that trolls in the comment section respond more to the gender of the poster than what is in the post. It was then suggested by another journalist, whose name escapes me, that some of the women writers at the Guardian have fake comment accounts and that they take turns positing positive comments under articles written by women but using a male name. The theory being that the first comment posted sets the tone for the subsequent commentators and that using a male name to make a positive comment is more effective than using a woman's name. 

Week Woman is right that the cliche to never read the comments or write one yourself is a silencing tactic used against women. After all, no one wants to be subjected to that level of abuse. The question is can we reclaim that space? Do we want to?

I'm not sure.

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Apparently, the Queen is on our bank notes! I genuinely did not know that ...

and I would personally like to thank everyman, from Mervyn King, down for pointing that out to me. After all, my vagina makes it impossible for me to turn over the bank note to see the other side.

For those owners of vaginas out there who were totally smart enough to have worked out that the Queen is a) female and b) on banknotes, there is a petition here demanding that the Bank of England keep a woman on English banknotes. 

Do check out Caroline Criado-Perez's response to Mervyn King's pansplainin'. It made me snigger, as did Caroline's storify of every nincompoop who tweeted her to make the same stupid statement. Nothing makes me weep for the fate of humanity than a bunch of men pointing out the blatantly obvious and then getting all confused when we don't give them cookies and blowjobs for not being stupid.

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Cultural Femicide on a Sunday Morning

Sunday’s TV guide: 66 males and 18 females are named.

Reblogged from Tricialo

On Sunday after a morning lie-in I wandered downstairs, grabbed a cuppa and idly flicked through the channels on my TV. On every screen I flicked through, out of around 20 ‘favourites, there were only male faces, not one single woman or girl’s face showed up. It was all men talking to men, men talking about men, male actors acting out male dominated drama; there was Eddie, Nick, James, Jeremy, Simon, Frasier, Tony and on and on, on every channel. I went through them all again just to make sure; even the children’s channels were boy dominated. Some women showed up as I watched a little longer, but they weren’t onscreen when I’d first flicked through and in general women were either minor characters or absent. It wasn’t until around 10.30 that a woman fronted show turned up; something about food, with Lynda Bellingham.

People can come up with as many reasons as they like for explaining this, but I’d bet my life that no-one has ever yet flicked through all the channels on offer and seen only women’s faces. The words cultural femicide came into my head. Cultural Femicide is a term which was originally coined, (as far as I know), by Bidisha, to mean ‘the erasure of women in public life’.  This absence of women in mainstream culture, on our TV screens and radio, in theatres, movies, libraries and art galleries is hard to credit. It amazes me how little some people even seem to notice it, never mind care. The Women’s Room is one website set up to challenge this gendered cultural hegemony and provide a voice for women in media, yet even those few female voices we do hear tend to be the type that seeks male approval.

Back to Sunday; my five year old daughter was in the room with me and I considered the effect it might be having on her to repeatedly see men showing up as experts and authorities. I don’t let her have a lot of screen time, but as she grows older and wiser it’s increasingly difficult to monitor her intake and I’m not sure that it’s desirable to keep her in a protected bubble anyway. She asked me if she could have some screen time, but was bored by the boy dominated shows on offer. She seen the words Angelina Ballerina on the screen; a show we’d just missed, she’d recently seen an Angelina Ballerina book at a friend’s house and was curious about it so asked me to make sure that she could watch it when it was next on. We watched an episode together, on my laptop. As the theme tune began, my daughter commented, ‘It’s so pink. Why is everything always so pink?” The episode we watched concerned four mice, two ‘girl’ mice, (wearing pretty dresses), and two boy mice. It’s the only episode I’ve ever watched, (and ever hope to), and it actually centred on a ‘boy’ mouse called AJ. It was AJ’s birthday and the other mice were planning a surprise party for him. So, in what I imagined would be a show that was, if not ideal, at least girl centred, I watched as the two girls planned how to make a boy happy. As it ended I asked my daughter if she’d liked it. She answered that she would have liked it better if it had been about Angelina.

Later on I let my daughter watch a film; part of the Studio Ghibli series currently showing on Film Four. Studio Ghibli is a Japanese company, generally seen as being much more girl friendly than US studios such as Disney, and it’s played an important part in my daughter’s movie intake to date. There are some great Ghibli films, but as a canon it’s far from perfect, and yesterday, yet again, we watched as the girl in the story became a princess, a prospective bride and had to be rescued by male characters. The film was ‘The Cat Returns,’ in which a girl, Haru, rescues a cat from a near death collision with a lorry. Unfortunately the cat is a prince and Haru is now expected to become his cat princess. She is rescued by a team of male helpers; the heroic Baron, another male cat and a male raven. There is one female cat who tries to help her; Haru’s first comment upon meeting her is about how beautiful she is; a white cat with long eyelashes and a pink bow, not stereotyped at all then. The few other females in the movie are unsympathetic characters, such as the two cat maidservants who help Haru to dress and tell her how lucky she is because all the girl cats have crushes on the prince. Early on in the film, a delegation from the Land of Cats marches past Haru’s window and stops to talk with her. At this point my daughter piped up; “Are all of those cats boys?” Well spotted little one, best get used to it.

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Silent Sunday IX: Inspiring and Thought-Provoking Blogs

Facebook is a Misogynist Time Sucking Piece of Shit by Ann Tagonist

8 Simple Rules for Not Being a Dick at It's Not A Zero Sum Game

We Could have Been Anything that We Wanted To Be at One Dames Thoughts

Activism to Normalise Gender Transitioning Now Comes at Children's Expense at Sex Matters

Letter to the Attorney General Regarding the Unduly Lenient Sentencing of Paul Keene for the Killing of Carmen Gabriela Miron Buchacra by Karen Ingala Smith

Counting Dead Women by Karen Ingala Smith

Desperate Art Dudes Can Only Save Themselves by Exploiting Women by Exiled Stardust

Sex Positivism: No Thanks by Portia Smart

Do You See What I See? by Portia Smart

The Peta Complex: On Post-Feminist Activism, Gender and Veganism at Feminist Current

Prostitution Chic is Now a Thing at Feminist Current

Letter to a Punter by Rebecca Mott

Separating the Art from the Artist by ScallopsRGreat

Men Who Knock Down Doors and the War Against Women: Tyrants at Home and Abroad at Common Dreams

The Fast Food Feminism of Topless Femen at International Boulevard 

A Feminist Critique of CIS Gender at Liberation Collective

Why Looking Through A Rapists' Eyes Won't Help You at That Pesky Feminist

Intersectionality has its Limitations at You Think I Just Don't Understand But I Don't Believe You

Sisterhood Doesn't Mean Unity at What Stilli Did

On Perpetual Twitter Beef at Renieddolodge

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Hilary Boyd's Thursdays in the Park

This is one of those books that I really wanted to enjoy. It is the story of a woman's reawakening after an unhappy marriage to an unpleasant man. Unfortunately, the entire book is the minimisation of male violence both in the marriage of the main character, Jeanie, and that of her daughter. Like Paula McLean, who wrote The Paris Wife,  Hilary Boyd seems to have little understanding of the level of coercion and control that is common. Boyd also gives both husbands an 'excuse' for their abusive behaviour: one is the victim of child sexual violence and the other suffers from extreme jealousy. Obviously, neither man is responsible for their own behaviour to the point that Jeanie labels herself a bitch for wanting out of her unhappy marriage.

I would really like to read a "romance" novel, since Jeanie had to find a new man rather than be happy by herself, that actually understood the dynamics of domestic violence. Just one. 

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Barbara Kingsolver's Pigs in Heaven

I love Barbara Kingsolver's books. I know I'm late to the party on this having only discovered her books two years ago but she is an amazing writer. The Poisonwood Bible is one of the best books I have ever read. Pigs in Heaven covers the same terrain as The Poisonwood Bible: motherhood, sisterhood, female friendships, family and surviving.

Pigs in Heaven is the story of Taylor and her adopted daughter Turtle who is Cherokee. The central plot is who Turtle really belongs too: the woman who illegally adopted her but who nurtured her through the trauma of her extensive physical and sexual abuse or the Cherokee nation into whom she was born. Kingsolver asks complicated questions about family and sisterhood and, whilst the ending is too pat, it is, fundamentally, a testament to how we should be raising our children: not as possessions but as members of extended communities built on love and tradition.

These are my two favourite quotes: 

Alice realises something important about her daughter at this moment: that she's genuinely a mother. She has changed in this way that motherhood changes you, so that you forget you every had time for small things like despising the color pink. 

... 

Sympathizing over the behavior of men is the baking soda of women's friendships, it seems, the thing that makes them bubble and rise.  

For obvious reasons. 

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Bristol Women's Literature Festival: Or, Where Stewie Would Rather Be this Weekend.

(Image from here)

Anyone who is familiar with this blog will know why I'd rather be at the Women's Literature Festival this weekend. A whole weekend dedicated to celebrating women writers and combatting cultural femicide: what's not to love? Unfortunately, and after consulting several maps, I am led to believe that Bristol is located not only nowhere near my house but also not on a single non-environmentally destructive form of public transport. (sulks)

Anyway, for those of you lucky enough to live in Bristol or within traveling distance, do check it out. The whole weekend looks fabulous.

The information below is taken directly from the Women's Literature Festival website:

Bristol Women’s Literature Festival brings together the country’s best women writers, academics and feminist commentators to the Watershed for a weekend of thought-provoking discussion, debate and activity.

Buy your tickets for the festival today.

The festival has three aims:

1. To celebrate the diversity and creativity of women writers
2. To counter the male dominance of literature and cultural festival line-ups
3. To promote women’s writing and literary history

Across the weekend of 16th-17th March, we’ll be hosting three panel discussions at the Watershed, along with a talk and film screening:

Out of the Ivory Tower: writing feminism for a non-academic audience

Women’s Writing today: contemporary women writers discuss their fiction

Bluestockings and Muses: a history of women’s writing

Bringing women’s issues to a mainstream TV audience + film

The Bristol Women’s Literature festival is entirely unfunded. If you would like to support this event, then please donate to us via the PayPal donate button.

Tickets still available!

Tickets have been going as fast as hot cakes and as a result Watershed has moved Saturday’s talks to a bigger room. Isn’t that great news? So if you’ve been worrying about getting tickets worry no more. We advise booking in advance to avoid disappointment but you are still probably fine to buy on the door. 

You can book your tickets by calling 0117 927 5100 or going online to Watershed. 

Book for Feminism on the Small Screen

Book for Women Writing Today

Book for Bluestockings and Muses

Book for Out of the Ivory Tower

So, what will you be booking?

A weekend ticket is available if you want to catch all four fascinating talks – to order yours just call  Watershed on 0117 927 5100 or go directly to the Box Office.

If you would like to hear renowned screenwriter Emilia di Girolamo talk about her career writing for Law and Order:UK and dramas like The Poison Tree, and how she brings women’s issues to a primetime audience you can book online now. Her talk takes place on 16 March, 11am along with a screening of Line Up.

To hear Stella Duffy, Helen Dunmore, Beatrice Hitchman and Selma Dabbagh read from their work and talk about Women Writing Today with Bidisha, you can book online now. They’ll be on at 3.30pm on Saturday 16th March.

Then, there’s Sunday. To book your tickets to discover the fascinating and often hidden history of women’s literature with Kate Williams, Dr Charlotte Crofts, Dr Marie Mulvey-Roberts, Professor Joan Adim-Addo and Professor Helen Taylor, you can go online now. This talk is happening at 2pm on Sunday 17 March.

And the festival finishes with a discussion on how writers today are bringing feminism to a new audience with Kristin Aune, Debi Withers and Josephine Tsui. Book your ticket now for 4pm on Sunday 17 March.

Individual tickets are £7/£6 and weekend tickets are £25/20. You can book via Watershed website or by calling the Box Office on 0117 927 5100

Book for Feminism on the Small Screen

Book for Women Writing Today

Book for Bluestockings and Muses

Book for Out of the Ivory Tower

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