Those male dragonflies must be super trump-y

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2129185-female-dragonflies-fake-sudden-death-to-avoid-male-advances/

I am seething with rage at how absolutely untrue this statement is. And especially when men say it, it fills me with anger like nothing else ever has.

Some dudes in my class said this to me the other day, and I was too taken aback to actually tell them how insanely false this is. Where and OH WHERE do men get the audacity to say shit like this? And we’re supposedly the illogical ones?? They’re just looking for any way that they can make women fight amongst each other, villainising some women from the community to prevent the others from looking at the REAL problem: men and their privilege.

It happened when women wanted to be able to vote, it happened when women wanted to make marital rape illegal, and it continues to happen even today. A woman is in NO WAY a woman’s worst enemy. It has and always will be bad men who do bad things because bad men before them gave them an infinite amount of power to do so.

I am so angry right now. Fuck this shit.

MY Vote is...

MY Vote is private. MY Vote is safe. MY Vote is my Right! MY Vote is my Responsibility. MY Vote is my kids' future. MY Vote is the future of the planet. MY Vote is preserving Democracy.

What does "MY Vote" mean to you?

Hey yall! My name is Em. I’m founding the Asheville Women’s Activism Association (through one of our colleges) which is going to be an intersectional feminism group focused on political activism, protests, volunteer work, and resources (especially for those who are SA, gRAPE, or DV victims/survivors). We welcome people of all gender identities btw! Write me if you are interested in joining!

Recently, the Archdiocese of Cincinnati decided to end its partnership with Girl Scouts in Southwest Ohio.

This may not seem like a big deal to many, and it may even seem like a good thing to a lot of folks given the collosal nightmare which is the Catholic history with children. If anything, if this was initiated by the Girl Scouts of America I'd be all for it. But this was done by a Catholic bishop in a very Catholic region and Catholic schools in Southwestern Ohio have over 40k students which represents a large percentage of students in this part of Ohio. It's meant to punish children -girls- for the politics of adults.

This region is also currently experiencing a drought of public space access for students to be at after school and schools are both logistically and financially one of the few low/no cost places for students to meet after school. This choice means many girls could lose the support, mentorship, and opportunities that Girl Scouts offer—skills that help them grow into confident leaders and strong individuals.

They're also pushing a local alternative called American Heritage Girls and that was formed as some kind of bizarre alternative to Girl Scouts and lacks the infrastructure or opportunities girl scouts offers.

This petition is asking Archbishop Schnurr to reconsider. If you believe in giving girls a space to lead, learn, and belong, please consider signing. Let’s make sure Girl Scouts in Southwest Ohio can continue to thrive.

I fully understand if the involvement of the Catholic Church in this is a bridge too far for lots of folks here but I would ask you to at least read the letter and then decide if you would like to support these girls.

Thank you,

Here’s the link if you’d like to add your voice: https://chng.it/kW94VZjGQk

I love this sub especially how we are fighting equal rights for women fighting gender apartheid and stuff like that. one thing that bugs me is when middleeastern women express their trauma due to religion or patriarchal abuse. some people in comments be like "or well this happens in western countries too or smthin like this happens every where" .like i get it ofc women are having hard time every where its true but like we should understand and listen to their problems and help them too this like saying all lives matter all of a sudden.

https://www.propublica.org/article/nevaeh-crain-death-texas-abortion-ban-emtala?utm_source=sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=majorinvestigations&utm_content=feature

I was heading to bed and this article popped up. Wish I hadn't read it. We've know for a while the far right wants to control us, but for me, I just realized how far it went. They want us to die. If we sleep with someone just for the hell of it or because we love the person we're with and get pregnant, I firmly believe they delight in it because they feel that's our only "function". When we make a choice not to carry or have serious health issues, they don't care. We're just the incubator and if we die, well we either "deserved it for spreading our legs" or "It was just God's plan". I'm just so numb. I feel sick.

Choice Feminism, as I understand it, is where women are given equal rights and then women are just allowed to be completely free to make the choices under the belief that they now have full agency and that their choices are "their own". This can be thought of as liberalism as opposed to progressivism. The term is either used disingenuously to support societal regression or used sincerely by well-meaning but myopic people.

It fundamentally ignores the fact that things such as your social environment and culture influence how you perceive the world and make your choices. So if your culture is misogynistic and patriarchal as all cultures still are, your choices will reflect that because they exist within that framework. Oppression can be and ubiquitously is internalised. And people genuinely do make choices that detriment themselves.

And some of these women want to go BACK to traditional gender roles including the restriction of women's rights. An argument that I've heard given by those kind of women is that feminism is about giving women the "right to make their own choices" and "say anything they want" so they should be allowed to advocate for traditional gender roles. That logic implies that it would be feminist to be antifeminist, because antifeminist women would just be saying what they think "as feminists want". That obviously makes no sense because it's paradoxical, and that's because it's wrong.

Feminism isn't about giving women total choice over everything to do with their lives. It's about gender equality and giving them rights. You have those rights now. That's absolutely not a choice. Under law, you don't get to get rid of the rights you're given. Whether you like it or not, they're your rights. Giving people the choice to restrict their rights with no apparent benefit is like going into an enslaved town to liberate some people and then when some of them say "thanks but I would like to go back to being exploited and enslaved now" you go "oh yeah no that's fine". Like, no mate. I'm giving you freedom. You don't just get to choose to go back. You're taking this freedom. I order you to be free!

And that's what feminism is. It's creating gender equality within society via the means of increasing women's rights. Even if you're a woman saying what you think, saying that you want to go back, that you want to enable and empower gender inequality and restrict women's rights, is firmly antifeminist. During the Suffragette movement, most women were antisuffragist and didn't want the right to vote. But they fucking got it anyway. Feminism is there to give you rights, whether you want them or not. And being against that means you're not a feminist.

The reason I decided to make this post is because of a video I was watching on Andrew Tate and the evidence surrounding his conviction. The video talked about how some victims spoke out but 2 victims actually defended Tate and his accomplices. The Romanian police reported that it had firmly established that these women were actually victims. They had been manipulated, coerced, exploited, and controlled. So why were they defending their abusers? Well, to put it frankly, they were fucking brainwashed. They worshipped Tate and the other abusers and I think this is a great analogy for society and how your social environment affects your choices. They defended their traffickers entirely of their own volition. They were happy to and they genuinely didn't want to see the abusers tried and incriminated. And how did Romania respond? They reported that it makes NO DIFFERENCE in whether or not it was voluntary on the part of the victims, their victimisation was still a crime. Are you seriously going to disagree with that? Because that's what choice feminist logic dictates. If yes, then how many women punished until the point of total submission so that they choose to be misogynists and enable and defend misogyny will it take for you to change your mind? People can and constantly do make decisions that are not in their own interest and also not in the interest of society. We voted for Brexit ffs.

And, as these women were submitted into misogyny, the average woman is also submitted into patriarchal norms and thinking. Their choices are still patriarchal and feminine and sexist because that is what our social environment demands of us. Not only this but, without progressivism, the problem can get worse and society can regress. Femininity is still the standards for how a woman is expected to live and behave and almost every woman conforms to these standards to an extent and this conformity partly constitutes your "choices". So the culture doesn't just dissipate. Without progressive activism against these cultural standards, they will remain for millennia and may even get worse. Cultural standards of expected behaviours actually often do get worse. They exacerbate themselves which can be observed with all kinds of traditions throughout history. This can manifest itself as actual activism for and promotion of these standards. There are plenty of male and female misogynists that strongly advocate for societal regression and the restriction of women's rights. And there are women such as tradwives that passively and actively promote traditional gender roles in order to influence the change that they want without being seen as explicit activists. They are covertly trying to sell you a lifestyle that they want you to conform to.... because Jesus.... and this will work very well on future generations that won't really know misogyny and gender inequality and so will be beguiled by the romanticism of traditional gender roles that are secretly very oppressive. With enough support, backwards ass thinking like this from both men and women CAN and WILL take over as recent years have shown.

So this is why 'choice feminism' isn't real feminism and actually enables and produces antifeminism. It's a term used sinisterly by conservatives or sincerely by the myopic who enable them. You either have gender equality or you don't and continuing to conform to gender is always going to produce gender inequality because gender conformity fundamentally IS gender inequality. As much as people may not want to hear it, that's the reality.

I feel so strong right now 💪

Ok, so my dad can be... Stubborn? Ig. And a little in his own world i find. I feel like he sometimes he picks a direction and stops listening to outside opinions. This is just my pov of him tho

It's hard cuz I want him to be more thoughtful and aware of people around him, but he thinks he's already a good listener so he just... stops working on it.

I find him difficult to talk to be honest....

But tonight I think I finally talked to him eye to eye. It was tough. I was totally locked in on using my words to communicate feelings effectively 🥋

I have never spoken quite so strongly. It was my best therapist voice. I was firm, but fair. And I was honest while calm.

That was strong. I feel strong 💪

https://x.com/guelphgirlchris/status/1852032316857537000

To blue women in red homes, I hope you can have the courage and safety to vote as you wish.