During a crowded bus journey, my daughter's shrill four-year-old voice piped up clearly and succinctly above the hum of the ongoing conversation: "I want to have sex with [insert classmate here]." A silence, not unlike the one pervading the moment before the conductor raises his baton, fell in anticipation of my reply. And on behalf of all the sex-positive parents, I swallowed … [Read more...]
Fellow White Women: We Learned To Be Complicit With Oppression — Now We Must Become Brave
This article was originally published on louisaleontiades.com as "The Cowardice of White Women: Learning to Resist" and is republished with permission. Some questions you don’t expect to have to ask in your lifetime, let alone answer. But with the rise of Trumpian fascism, a question has consistently rattled around my white woman’s brain: At what point would I put my own life … [Read more...]
Too “Politically Correct”?: Why It Matters for Comedy To Punch Up Instead of Down
For a large portion of my childhood, I believed that the Spanish were incapable fools, the Germans were evil dogmatists, and the French were bumbling, puffed-up nincompoops. Given these attitudes, it can come as little surprise that I'm English and grew up with comedy that relentlessly mocked foreigners, the upper classes, the lower classes, the disabled, the neuroatypical, the … [Read more...]
Why We Should Say “Female Genital Cutting” and Not “Mutilation”
Having worked on campaigns like the Olympics and the Paralympics, London-born Jay Kamara Frederick believes the key to her award winning marketing is that she always tries to understand her audience’s mind-set. But that’s something, she says, that Austrian-born feminist Fran Hosken failed to do in her 1976 manifesto ‘The Hosken Report: Genital/Sexual Mutilation.’ Despite her … [Read more...]
Dear White Women: Why We Need To Stop Crying When POC Call Us Out
I was once in an abusive relationship. Few people agree that it was abusive, because I left him after he'd hit me a couple of times. But they weren't there everyday for a period of years when he cajoled me into having sex by saying, 'your body wants me.' I'd often reply, 'but my mind doesn't...' I felt that this was somehow important even if I wasn't 100% convinced. Not that … [Read more...]
How Do We Create Consent Culture With Our Children?
As many cis het white women know right now, it is a time for us to learn everything we have been doing wrong and make amends. But whilst many claim to love learning, discussions of race are hampered because it means confronting our own failings and actively choosing to be vulnerable to the rage of those we have unwittingly oppressed or abused, even if our crime has 'simply' … [Read more...]
7 Self-Care Tips for Parents of Young Kids
This article was originally published on Ravishly.com and is republished with permission. Feeling guilty won’t help your kids, but it sure will fuck you up. It started when my wife saw an old Facebook post of hers, one which equated sleeping in with self-care, saying something to the effect of, “wow sleeping 12 hours was exactly what I needed!” It was 5 … [Read more...]
7 Things You Learn Raising Kids in an Open Relationship
"Have you thought about how a polyamorous relationship works with kids?" my colleague asked as I suppressed a smile. I've written a book about it, I was tempted to say. Do they sense any instability? I've spent hours at a time analysing their actions and reactions. Are they at more risk from bullying due to the unconventional nature of their parents' relationship? We've … [Read more...]
How Do We Make Online Feminism Less US-Centric?
"I learned a lesson at Sunday school," said my domestic partner-in-crime. "It said that God prevented our rise to power by making us speak different languages so we couldn't understand each other. Different languages aren't a blessing; they're a fucking punishment." He'd just got off the phone with Vodafone internet support in Berlin, our home of mere weeks. They didn't speak … [Read more...]
The Price of Polyamory: Intentional Families, Too Many In-Laws, and Loving Support
We’re off to a wedding. I love weddings. Love ‘em, even though I already know I’ll start crying at the bridal march. Like many weddings, this one will be a heady mixture of joyous celebration spiked with massive logistical angst and the usual smattering of unforeseen hiccups--fodder, no doubt, for anecdotes at family reunions in the years to come. But instead of the … [Read more...]
When White People are Silent in the Situations of Injustice, They Have Chosen the Side of the Oppressor
Right now there's a narrative sweeping the activist psyche: white people as a segment of society are oppressive and if we are not directly abusive or oppressive ourselves, our ignorance and silence means we are enablers of abuse and oppression. As a white woman and a mother, I along with many others, have resisted such a narrative. Not only because to be defined as abusive … [Read more...]
7 Things Not to Say to Someone Who is Pregnant
I've found in general that projecting my own life experience onto others is a Very Bad Idea unless I know the person well enough to make a highly educated guess plus an explicit admission up front that they know what they are going through better than I do. Though this should be well known, there are certain circumstances, in which in our society apparently dictate that … [Read more...]
#MeToo: Will My Son Grow up to be a Rapist?
After the flurry of #MeToo’s had died down in my social media feed, it was not fears for my daughter which kept me awake that night. Not because I know she won't be violated at some point in her life. She will, unless she's exceedingly lucky, because living in our abusive culture means it is practically inevitable. My job is to love and educate her as hard as I can, which also … [Read more...]
Why I’m Grateful I Have a Borderline Personality Disorder Diagnosis
My mouth hovers a millimetre or so away from the surface. The bath water is warm and ripple free. The sound of my heartbeat echoes in my ears. If only the water level was slightly higher, I would inhale this vaguely rose-scented peace, return to the void and sink into blissful oblivion. My relaxed heart thuds more slowly and I observe it, contentedly, before pulling the plug … [Read more...]
