I thought the February rain would be a good excuse not to go to the outdoor "Konyoku" (co-ed) onsen, but naturally I was the only one put out by the weather. Even Hannah's lack of a nap failed as a deterrent. She was unbelievably cheerful, just a little sleepy. Ok, fine. I'll go.
I have the choice to either undress in a communal smokey shack with the men, or in a musty women's locker room. Shyly I choose the locker room. I am greeted by the heady steam of old women in control top underwear and knee-high stockings. Their flushed faces and twinkling eyes attest to the healing effects of the Konyoku. I smile as (topless) they laugh with Hannah and touch her soft cheeks. I touch them too. You will grow up comfortable in your own skin, little girl.
Making my way to the bath on the rainy roof of the hotel, I smile at my friends and show a bold confidence that I don't feel. Hannah squirms under the cold raindrops and I ease her into the hot water next to her father. Having lost my only cover, I quickly follow. We sit there in our 2-foot deep bath of boiling water, rain pelting our faces, skin blushing from . . . the heat. While making small talk about the weather and work we watch pigeons bathe in puddles among the rocks and boulders . I'm only half-listening.
"...wonder if they ever poop in the pool."
"...really would be nice if all those buildings weren't there."
"...guy is showering again. Will he never leave?"
"...think they'll stay another year?"
"Not a chance."
"...you getting out Suzie?"
I am outside of myself. I see a woman who is self-conscious and hates herself for it. She's trying to make a statement - to prove that her body is nothing to be ashamed of. She feels the burdens of Eve, Knowledge, and thousands of years of patriarchy weighing on her naked shoulders, and she wants to crawl under one of the boulders and cry. She wonders what the other men are thinking. She nearly despises their silence.
I take Hannah's wiggling body back into my arms. My warm rosy baby splashes with delight at the freedom of no diapers or onesies. She's in her element, and I envy that. Don't grow up baby. Stay young and dimpled and innocent. Shake off the stereotypes and body-images the world will try to press you to accept. Splash naked in the water forever.
Showing posts with label feminism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label feminism. Show all posts
Monday, February 23, 2009
Friday, September 26, 2008
Sarah Palin
Written by Eve Ensler, author of "The Vagina Monologues"
"I don’t like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story — connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.
I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country choose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.
Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God’s plan.
She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin’s view, is there to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, ‘It was a task from God.’
Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist’s baby or not. She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.
Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.
Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds of wolves from the air.
Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God’s name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything America has ever tried to be.
I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not just of the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and health care or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.
If the Polar Bears don’t move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, ‘Drill Drill Drill.’ I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent. I think of pain.
Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?"
"I don’t like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story — connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.
I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country choose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.
Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God’s plan.
She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin’s view, is there to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, ‘It was a task from God.’
Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist’s baby or not. She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.
Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.
Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds of wolves from the air.
Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God’s name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything America has ever tried to be.
I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not just of the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and health care or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.
If the Polar Bears don’t move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, ‘Drill Drill Drill.’ I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent. I think of pain.
Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?"
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Please Wipe Feet
A friend of Hans' has labeled me as a feminist, because "I'm mean." Seriously, how dim can you get? He says I've changed since I had Hannah, that I'm more confrontational and outspoken. I'll agree with the latter. I made a choice a while back to be more honest with myself and others, and I know that honesty can have its repercussions. I'm willing to take the hit when my openness insults others, or makes them feel uncomfortable. I'm not too small to say I'm sorry. That doesn't change how I feel, though.
Feminism has gained a really bad rap over the years. Yes, I believe in equality of the sexes, but I do NOT believe that men and women are the same. I doubt this guy even knows what feminism is, but if he thinks a feminist is a woman who isn't meek, submissive and passive, then yes, I suppose I am a feminist. Why is it that women who speak their minds as much as men do are labeled as feminists (or, even funnier, "masculine")? What is wrong with telling people how I feel? I'm sorry, but I refuse to be ashamed. If you want the kind of woman who meekly obeys, agrees with everything you say and do, and spends all of her time accommodating you and your sexist opinions, marry a doormat. And don't complain when your friend chooses a woman who thinks for herself and doesn't put up with the crap that comes out of your mouth.
Feminism has gained a really bad rap over the years. Yes, I believe in equality of the sexes, but I do NOT believe that men and women are the same. I doubt this guy even knows what feminism is, but if he thinks a feminist is a woman who isn't meek, submissive and passive, then yes, I suppose I am a feminist. Why is it that women who speak their minds as much as men do are labeled as feminists (or, even funnier, "masculine")? What is wrong with telling people how I feel? I'm sorry, but I refuse to be ashamed. If you want the kind of woman who meekly obeys, agrees with everything you say and do, and spends all of her time accommodating you and your sexist opinions, marry a doormat. And don't complain when your friend chooses a woman who thinks for herself and doesn't put up with the crap that comes out of your mouth.
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