A month ago, the Hollywood Chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW) and the City of West Hollywood presented the Vagina Monologues. The event was a complete success and we raised over $5,000 for Planned Parenthood Los Angeles! While the cast and crew worked together and formed a community in West Hollywood, communities were being ripped apart by senseless gun violence that took the lives of 17 beautiful souls at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida
The cast and crew began to have discussions over a specific monologue and whether or not the audience, or cast members, would be triggered by its use of gun specific language in relation to the power of the vagina.
Feminazi is an image and narrative created by patriarchy to control the liberation and recognition of women as autonomous political subjects, and to serve as a warning to thwart these processes.
It is a label used for male supremacy to name the fearless woman. Fear is a control mechanism used to keep us living in terror of: expressing opinions, gaining weight, walking on the street, being raped, ridiculed, or lonely, not being married, being rejected, or dismissed, having too much cellulite, going to hell, traveling alone, being beaten, believing in ourselves, etc.
Feminazi is a modern myth designed to make us believe that there are good and bad feminists, and that it is possible to exclude and ignore all feminists through labels and stereotypes. A woman’s transition toward liberation can be seen as threatening to others when it is assumed that “someone else” outside the woman herself, has the privilege to define which feminisms are acceptable, or which processes of liberation and searching for autonomy are legitimate, or not.
On February 20, 2018, the Greek government issued a Presidential Decree mandating the formation of government bodies to monitor and protect the more than four hundred bird and wildlife habitats in Greece designated as part of the European law Natura 2000. This decision came after decades of government inaction regarding the enforcement of the Natura law it accepted as part of its entrance into the European Union.
Whether the Presidential Decree will result in protection on the ground remains to be seen, but it is an important step in the right direction. The Presidential Decree was issued after years of negotiations initiated by the European Commission to compel the Greek government to comply with the law. A Complaint to the European Commission regarding failure to protect the Natura wetlands of Lesbos on which I was the first author formed part of the basis of these negotiations.
a ditch drains a wetland to produce agricultural land
Almost as soon as I became a birdwatcher in 1999, I began to notice the degradation of bird habitats by dumping, drainage, and building, especially in wetland areas. Wetlands are seasonal bodies of water created by winter rains that dry out in the summer heat. Generally, they are shallow, which means that they are a perfect stopping over place for migrating birds. The most common visitors to wetlands are wading birds that stand in shallow pools and puddles without immersing their bodies in the water. Lesbos, the island where I began to watch birds, has some of the most important wetlands in Europe, visited by birds migrating from Africa to Europe in the spring for rest and feeding. Because of this, Lesbos is also a destination for birdwatchers.
Wetlands are not only important for birds. In rainy periods they act as a sponge between rivers and the sea and dry land, absorbing water that otherwise could cause flooding. The devastating flood damage to New Orleans in recent years is the result of building on wetlands. Similar damage occurs regularly wherever wetlands are drained, including on the island of Lesbos.
In 2001, I wrote a petition that was signed by over 600 birdwatchers and others urging the Greek government to protect the wetlands of Lesbos. I presented it at an open meeting in May 2001 organized by the Mayor of Kalloni, Lesbos, Aris Eleftheriou, to explain the plan to protect the wetlands of Kalloni which had been funded by the European Union. Instead of being congratulated for his work and vision, the mayor was met by an angry mob. Many of the Natura wetlands are privately owned fields traditionally used for grazing sheep and goats. As local economies were transitioning to tourism, landowners did not want any restrictions placed on their ability to drain and build on their land.
flamingos are now permanent residents of Lesbos
It was in this context that John Bowers, a longtime birdwatcher in Lesbos, an environmental economist, and the first to sign my petition, formed Friends of Green Lesbos, an international internet-based group dedicated to protecting the wetlands of Lesbos that soon counted over 800 members. I became its Vice President. In 2003, Friends of Green Lesbos, in co-operation with Idatinos, a local environmental group, drafted an internet letter and petition, that was automatically sent to the Greek government every time it was signed, asking the Greek government to fulfill its legal responsibility to protect the wetlands of Lesbos. The government responded that it was required to enforce the Natura law even though no specific Greek law had been passed specifying how this was to be done. A committee in the department of building and land development in Lesbos was created and charged with the responsibility of protecting the local wetlands.
We did not understand that this committee would not be monitoring the wetlands on a regular basis, but would only respond to complaints. This was clarified at a meeting organized by World Wildlife Fund in Athens in 2005. I was then put in touch with a new local environmental group, Nautilos en drasi that was also formed to save wetlands. Together with WWF, we began to draft complaints about the degradation of individual wetlands. These complaints, numbering well over fifty, were all decided in our favor. Fines were issued, but there was no mechanism to ensure compliance. Numerous meetings with the Governor of the island resulted in promises that were not kept. We finally realized that he was more interested in currying favor with landowners and developers than in enforcing the law.
In 2008 while lecturing at a conference in Ireland, I met a Green Party member of the European Parliament who encouraged me to write a complaint to the European Commission. After six months of intense effort, I completed a formal complaint of over 100 single-spaced pages, supported by two large files of documents, detailing the government’s failure to protect the wetlands under the Natura law. It was immediately approved by Friends of Green Lesbos and Nautilos en drasi, but it took over two years for World Wildlife Fund and Hellenic Ornithological Society to revise and sign it.
The complaint was submitted to the European Commission in September 2011. After several requests for additional documentation, the Commission found Greece in violation of the Natura law in Lesbos in October 2014. In August 2016 the Commission informed us that it had made our case part of horizontal negotiations with Greece regarding its failure to protect all of its Natura sites. The February 2018 Presidential Decree is the fruit of these negotiations. It is certain that the European Commission will continue to watch the situation in Greece to ensure that the government follows through with the monitoring and protection mandated by the new law.
This has been a long and tiring and often discouraging struggle of nearly two decades and it is still ongoing, but if the end result is the protection of all of the Natura sites in Greece, it will have been well worth it.
Others involved in Natura struggles in Lesbos besides John Bowers and myself include Eleni Galinou, Michael Bakas, Costas Zorbas, and Stellios Kraonakis, and in Athens, Foteini Vrettou, George Chassiotis, and Elias Tzirtzis of World Wildlife Fund Greece, and Malamo Korbeti of Hellenic Ornithological Society.
In celebration of Women’s History Month, the Holy Women Icons Project is excited to launch Revolutionary Girls, a new program seeking to empower marginalized adolescent girls by telling the stories of revolutionary women through art, writing, and discussion. Partnering with local schools and other non-profit organizations in the Puna District of Hawai’i County, we are creating a curriculum that features often overlooked historical and mythological women whose lives, legends, and legacies embody empowerment, resilience, and emotional intelligence that can embolden adolescent girls to become socially aware revolutionary leaders.
Research shows that girls’ self-esteem plummets in early adolescence, due in part to unrealistic body images in media and casual (or even overt) sexism from parents, teachers, and peers. Our Revolutionary Girls project aims to counter these negative influences by offering girls aged 11-15 a space of empowerment. Prior to adolescence, many girls believe they are as smart, strong, and capable of leadership as boys. At the onset of puberty, girls are often taught that their only value is in their appearance, and that they are not as capable or valuable as men and boys. Simultaneously, girls are exposed primarily to the histories and myths of men in power while in the classroom, the revolutionary lives, legends, and legacies of countless revolutionary women altogether absent from their textbooks and lessons. Continue reading “Women’s History Month: Painting and Empowering Adolescent Girls by Angela Yarber”
Happy International Women’s Day! I hope it is a happy day for you as we recognize women’s achievements throughout the world. Our FAR community is not only for or about women, but as feminists in some form or another, collectively we support women, their growth, their health, and their contributions to the world. On a day like today, we should take note of what still needs to be done and recommit ourselves to our work. But let’s not rush past an opportunity for joy and celebration. Many generations of women have fought for equal rights and participation in all sectors of society, and we have made progress. To commemorate that legacy today, I am highlighting just a few of the women who inspire me with their lives and with their work. They are my “womenspiration.” My hope is that you join me in recognizing them and that as you read about them, you reflect on the women who inspire you.
As a public school administrator, and a human, I feel tremendous grief for the tragedy generated in the latest school shooting. The impact is devastating and disastrous. Immediately after such a calamity is the public outcry for change and the immediate backlash from others who don’t want to lose their perceived rights under the constitution. Blaming federal agencies isn’t the answer either.
I find it critical to recognize that school shootings are not isolated events. Despite the outcry and current tug-of-war, stricter gun laws will only serve as a Band-Aid to one aspect of a major debilitating world problem. In just over 15 years of serving children and communities as a school administrator, I have witnessed extreme violence, rape, racism, walkouts orchestrated by teachers, administrators engaged in illegal behavior, parents abusing children, bullying, decay, outrageous political power struggles, and more.
Public schools are a microcosm of society; they are not stand-alone programs independent of the larger world. Truthfully, I am sometimes quite taken with how successful school programs are across the nation in spite of these immense pressures and misguided criticisms. Increasing student achievement in math and the English language arts is our charge; sometimes the realities and tragedies of life make this very difficult. But, that isn’t the point of this conversation.
I’ve long held that feminism, in order to be true and engaged and practical, must be intersectional. The work of justice for women must also include justice for other marginalized groups. Because many women are also LGBTQ, people of color, people with disabilities, Muslims, immigrants, and others marginalized for identities other than their gender. Paying attention to these intersections—of sexuality, gender, race, class, ability, religion—and acknowledging that many people have multiple intersecting identities for which they are oppressed is vital to the work of justice.
These thoughts remained at the forefront of my mind as I recently marched in one of the sister marches of the Women’s March in my home of Hilo, Hawaii. I heard many straight, white, cisgender women claim that women are not oppressed while mocking the march as irrelevant. I heard some gay men purport that such a march was unnecessary. And I wondered. Are not women of color also women? Muslim women? Immigrant women? Women with disabilities? Queer women? Trans women? Are not our quests for liberation and rights and legal validity interrelated, mutually dependent, might I even say, intersectional? Continue reading “The Protest Goddess by Angela Yarber”
Have you heard about, applied or received the Feminist-O-Meter lately?
The Feminist-O-Meter is a tool that often appears in feminisms and women rights activisms, fostering power struggles, cliques, jealousies and -if that is not enough – encouraging the reproduction of mainstream socialization that fosters competition and alienation among women.
It can be summed in the expression:
“Not my way to see Feminism? Then, that’s NOT Feminism”
I see feminisms as revolutions of subjectivities based on the radical idea that women are people … and it turns out that people are diverse, we are the result of our experience and the way we interpret them.
So, I do not understand why there is so much drama, judgment, outrage and social punishment in feminist spaces when those involved are undertaking the process of discovery, of claiming back our personhood by legitimizing our different ways of thinking, our understandings of liberation, and our acknowledgment of what makes us happy and makes us feel feminist.
When I was in graduate school, I learned to doubt myself. Despite having won Danforth and Woodrow Wilson graduate fellowships that paid for my tuition and living expenses, I was continually told by professors and male students alike that I would not finish my degree and that if I did I would get married, have children, and never use the degree I had earned. I tried hard to maintain my confidence in myself, but it was difficult when I was the only woman in the program. There was one other woman my first year, but she was older than I was, a nun, and I never saw her in class or at social events. My self-esteem was gradually eroded. If I had not had a fellowship, I would probably have dropped out.
Fast forward a few years. There were several more women in the program, but only one in theology, my friend Judith Plaskow, and she too struggled. I was working on my comprehensive exams and wondering if I had what it takes to pass them and then write a Ph.D. thesis. After the initial shock of being treated as if I was not the equal of the male students in the program, I began to look around me. A few of the male students seemed really bright, many of them were average, and some of them were plodders. I hate to admit it, but I looked at the least competent among them and said to myself, “If he can do it, then surely I can.” And I did. I passed my exams. A few years later my Ph.D. thesis was approved.
If contributions to the field are any indication, Judith Plaskow and I were not only as good as the most mediocre men in our graduate program, we smarter than the average ones, and at least as smart as the smartest ones. But we didn’t know that then. Men have been getting degrees and being promoted and moved up that ladder because other men like them, identify with them, feel sorry for them, and for lots of other reasons having nothing to do with excellence, and sometimes not even do do with competence.
Last week I heard Cecile Richards say something to Lawrence O’Donnell that reminded me of this. Speaking of the huge numbers of women who—inspired by the women’s marches–will be voting, registering voters, campaigning, and running for office in 2018 and beyond, she said women “totally understand that they can do better than who’s in office now.”
photo by Marie Cartier
For far too many years women have been held back by lack of self-confidence and self-esteem. We didn’t think we could and we didn’t. We don’t think we can and we don’t. We thought men were smarter than us or had more time or more drive. The founder of the Society of Women Engineers at San Jose State told my classes that women who got even one B+ in an engineering class were likely to drop out of the program, while men graduated who graduated with C averages went on to get great jobs. Now we see truly mediocre white men holding public office all across the country and in its highest offices. The harm they are doing to women, to children, to the elderly, to people of color, to the environment has been a wake-up call for all of us. There are so many mediocre white men in office that women–of all colors and ethnicities–are realizing that we can do better than that! Once we begin to see what we can do when there are large numbers of us holding office all across the country, there will be no stopping us!
On Sunday, January 7th, a highly visible and poignant protest and stance was made. The 75th Golden Globes was the frontline to which the privileged Hollywood A-Listers took a stance. They collectively drew a line, a call for change. A straightforward act of wearing the color black, spoke volumes. Gone were the entertainment commentators stating which color was bold or trendy. The focus was on the collective statement that was being made on the red carpet. Countless actors voiced their own stories of #WhyWeWearBlack, they called out executives who are complicit in maintaining pay inequality, in hiding sexual abuse and intimidation, in the unequal job opportunities, and even in the lack of recognition.
In celebration of 
When I was in graduate school, I learned to doubt myself. Despite having won Danforth and Woodrow Wilson graduate fellowships that paid for my tuition and living expenses, I was continually told by professors and male students alike that I would not finish my degree and that if I did I would get married, have children, and never use the degree I had earned. I tried hard to maintain my confidence in myself, but it was difficult when I was the only woman in the program. There was one other woman my first year, but she was older than I was, a nun, and I never saw her in class or at social events. My self-esteem was gradually eroded. If I had not had a fellowship, I would probably have dropped out.
On Sunday, January 7th, a highly visible and poignant protest and stance was made. The 75th Golden Globes was the frontline to which the privileged Hollywood A-Listers took a stance. They collectively drew a line, a call for change. A straightforward act of wearing the color black, spoke volumes. Gone were the entertainment commentators stating which color was bold or trendy. The focus was on the collective statement that was being made on the red carpet. Countless actors voiced their own stories of #WhyWeWearBlack, they called out executives who are complicit in maintaining pay inequality, in hiding sexual abuse and intimidation, in the unequal job opportunities, and even in the lack of recognition.
Feminism and Religion 