Welcome Readers,

After a brief break from blogging, the F-word has been refreshed. We are excited for our articles this issue which discuss topics from definitions of feminism to social house stereotypes.

We hope that the F-word is a place where people can feel free to write their opinions and thoughts. We hope to encourage dialogue through reader’s comments and responses. So please, read, write, think, and join us in our wandering journey of musings about gender issues.

Our future issues will be focused around Sexual Assault Awareness Week, Gaypril, and summertime, although we hope to have articles on many other topics as well.

Thank you for gracing our page with your browser.

The editors.

Please send questions, comments and future articles to: fwordadmin@gmail.com

Cosmo vs. Sports Illustrated for Women

By Sarah

Ever since I was in eighth grade, I’ve been bitten by a pseudo-activist bug. The assistant coach of my soccer team told me and my teammates about a full day conference for teenage girls at the local university. It featured workshops and speakers dealing with a range of issues, from grassroots activism to eating disorders to self defense workshops. Before the conference, I had never really paused to think about activism as it related to me, but walking out of those workshops, I felt bold and powerful and hungry to act.

I joined the group that organized the conference the next year. Activism, as I had spoken or read about, became a reality. I lead a club at my school dealing with women’s issues; I spoke up in discussions. I even bought a t-shirt proclaiming “feminists are HOT…. and bothered”. But I only wore it to school once. Sometimes I got tired of defending my opinions against the cacophony of dissenters. I knew what was right. I stood up for that. But making change is tiring, and sometimes isolating. I was like most high school and middle school-ers, where fading in rather than standing out was often the goal. Inherent to activism is opposing the norm, so what happens when you don’t always feel like fighting? Can you still be an activist?

I believe that you can be. But these questions continue to be dilemmas that I grapple with. I believe that activism can take many forms, and that activists are many types of people. I think that the strength of publications like this blog is their acceptance and celebration of that fact. Like the F-Word, magazines and publications not only present news, opinion and information, but create a relationship with the readers. And through that forum, the questions and dilemmas like mine begin to be resolved.

Sometimes, it felt like magazines promoted the binary I’ve described. I secretly loved glossy gossip magazines. A friend had subscriptions to Seventeen, Cosmo Girl and others, and I would devour them with a staged nonchalance. But reading them I felt that I was cheating another side of myself because I could identify so many instances of articles, advertising and photos that hurt, rather than helped, young women.

And yet, I’ve also found solace in magazines. When I was younger, I subscribed to New Moon, a magazine featuring poetry and short stories written by young girls and whose goal was to empower young women. Later on, I subscribed to Sports Illustrated for Women. I was only in middle school and for some reason I take pride in the fact that I supported such a worthwhile effort. SI for Women focused exclusively on female athletics. Without many pro athletes to profile, college and alternative sport athletes (women who seemed more accessible to young me) were the central focus of the magazine. In those years, the women of the US women’s national soccer team became my idols and celebrities. Those magazines discussed issues from the lens of engaged, thoughtful women. Those magazines gave me a base to critique news and reminded me that I was surrounded by likeminded women all around the world.

Ultimately, I don’t think that there has to be a division between the two types of magazines I’ve described, or between different parts of a personality. When I was younger and starting to explore what it meant to be an activist, I don’t think that I understood that.

F-Word is even more than these magazines, because its online nature allows it to become more than the initial articles. So I hope that in this virtual community, each reader is empowered to be themselves, as active as they feel comfortable.

I leave you with a favorite poem I’ve recently re-discovered. Blessing the Boats by Lucille Clifton feels an appropriate inclusion because it celebrates the faith that one must place in the intangible; in the communities that support you, in the strength of yourself. And furthermore, like the blessing of a new boat, these new posts represent the re-launch of this wonderful F-Word community.

Blessing the Boats

may the tide

that is entering even now

the lip of our understanding

carry you out

beyond the face of fear

may you kiss

the wind then turn from it

certain that it will

love your back may you

open your eyes to water

water waving forever

and may you in your innocence

sail through this to that

-Lucille Clifton

Millan’s Women’s History Month Playlist

1. Revolution- Tracy Chapman
2. Gratitude- Ani di Franco
3. If I Were a Boy- Beyoncé
4. This is the Life- Amy MacDonald
5. Ma France à Moi – Diam’s
6. Since You’ve Been Gone- Kelly Clarkson
7. Sister Self- Alela Diane
8. You Don’t Own Me- Goldie Hawn, Bette Midler and Diane Keaton
9. Just a Girl- No Doubt
10. Before He Cheats- Carrie Underwood
11. Twisted- Joni Mitchell
12. Lola- The Kinks
13. Toast to the Girls- Willa Ford
14. Sunshowers- M.I.A.
15. Butterfly Girl- Marie Modiano
16. Red Cape- Priscilla Ahn
17. When I Was a Young Girl- Feist
18. Love Song- Sara Bareilles
19. Hey You- Shakira
20. XXX’s and OOO’s- Trisha Yearwood
21. Belle- Beauty and the Beast
22. To Zion- Lauryn Hill
23. I Hope- Dixie Chicks

Memoir of a girl living at Baxter College House …

By Kristina

So, we all know the stereotypes of the College Houses.  Mac promotes bands, Howell is Chem – Free, etc.  Baxter is the “meat – head,” we are men who play manly sports and throw parties like Man-uary every night …

Now, I must further preface the remainder of this by saying I didn’t apply to live in Baxter.  I was rejected by Reslife from proctor-ship and then was the sole recipient of a rejection letter from Quinby.  During a distraught Kristina meets cool cucumber Kim meeting, Kim gave me, what I thought of as new, identity label: a strong female.  Due to this “fire” or whatever, Kim informed me she wanted to place me in Baxter.

Back to the stereotypes, me vs. the men, okay: I could not have been more wrong.  Baxter House was fabulous, half the guys lived in Hyde (my freshman dorm) and/or it seemed went on my Pre-O.  The parties were great, the sociality was what-one-might-expect, but in no way “hyper” – man dominated.  The guys did a great job integrating entire house in events, never making situations “bro” – ified or exclusive. Inclusiveness, even if it meant simply “chilling,” always occurred.  When the guys did their thing they did not perpetrate typical bro – fest stereotype than any other typical “man” meeting.

Kudos to the men of Baxter (‘07 – ‘08) for being real men, not changing to fit the mold of the set stereotype.

Defining Feminism

By ma.

While studying abroad last semester, I encountered a type of American that I had no previous interactions with: the social conservative. Even though conservatives attend Bowdoin, I never ventured out from my self -imposed Liberal Land and engaged in conversation with them. In a program of seven girls however, it became a necessity to be on friendly terms with everyone.  Moreover, it was election season and politics frequented the topic of discussion.  Over the weeks, we discussed terrorism, family values, gay marriage, education, AIDS, gender equality, abortion, sexual assault, the election, the economy, and other equally charged topics. I began to see that the way I defined and identified with certain words as labels, such as American, female, student, and Obama fan, varied from the others. The definition of feminist varied most profoundly, and was therefore, for me, the most thought provoking.

During our many discussions, one pro-life student utilized classic feminist rhetoric to argue her position on women’s rights issues, from the right to work to the rights of a survivor of sexual assault. I was confused. Was this pro-lifer a feminist? When I asked her if she considered herself one, she said yes. While she recognized that pro-life and feminist are often seen as opposite, she said that feminism is the idea that women were equal to men and deserve the same rights and opportunities. Abortion care, in her view, belonged to a different category of rights. I found myself nodding, wanting to giver her space to define her proper identity, but I was not convinced. Alone, I pondered the topic. Is it possible be both a feminist and pro-life?

While we shared the basic tenants of feminism, I felt that somewhere an inherent opposition between pro-life ideology and the core of feminism existed. I think the foundation of feminism is choice. It’s the choice to work, of whom to marry, what to wear, what to do with your body, whether or not to have a baby etc. If the basis of feminism is choice, then being pro-life, in my mind, negates it. Another aspect of choice is, of course, the choice of what to believe. It is one’s right to choose to believe that abortion is wrong. We all have a right to choose insomuch as it does not limit another’s right to choose. While anyone can believe that abortion care is wrong, the transformation of that belief to law, impinges upon another’s choices. Feminism is the belief that we all deserve the same opportunities, that we deserve a choice. Pro-life sentiments limit other’s choices, and is thus, at heart, in discord with the fundamental principles of feminism.

While our discussions did not change my opinion on abortion care, I no longer regard views on the topic as absolute. After all, pro-lifers deserve the choice to make their own value judgments. While I will never agree with a pro-life stance, I will never again write it off whole-heartedly as an anti-feministic view. While pro-life beliefs contradict the pro-choice necessity of feminism, pro-lifers can still have a role in the feminist movement. If they believe in women’s equality, like this student, a pro-lifer is a worthy ally. Even if I never share the title of feminist with a pro-lifer, I will never again make the mistake of ignoring his/her role and potential contribution in women’s struggle for equality.

A quick word to say farewell! Emily, Crystal Queer, and I all graduated last weekend. We’re headed off into the world, so we won’t be doing much F-Wording in the foreseeable future. Speaking for myself, I want to thank everybody who made launching the blog possible. Taking the F-Word from nothing, to print, to blog was an awesome ride, and it would have been impossible with all the writers and editors who chipped in over the years. Thank you!! I feel confident we’ve left this baby in good hands. Take good care of it, BWA!

By Fleur Ish

Bodies. We’ve all got them. They are as different as snowflakes; more substantial but equally flawless. Buried beneath the layers of Patagonia and the rigid dictations of glossy magazines, it is easy to forget the strength of a limb, the contour of a hip.

By Crystal Queer

“You want me to do what?!”

Have you ever been surprised by anything a partner has wanted to do in bed?  Have you ever surprised someone else (or even yourself) with the things that you wanted to do or have done to you?

Sex is complicated enough when we stick to the “basics,” the things most people think of when they think of sex.  But the fact is that there is a huge variety of ways in which people get pleasure, and many of them are a little… well, weird.  At least, they can certainly seem so to others—in fact, the more unusual a particular behavior seems, the more likely it is to be labeled a fetish.

By Nicole 

The political atmosphere surrounding the presidential primaries is enough to ruffle even the most apathetic feathers. The idea that the first woman could be elected next November is particularly exciting for those of us who long to see a change in the status quo. This charged political climate has me thinking more deeply about women in politics, particularly at Bowdoin. Now that women hold nearly half of all jobs in the US, are about half of the nation’s college graduates and are currently enrolling in equal numbers to men in law school, the time is right to question how the Bowdoin Bubble measures up in regards to women’s political representation.

           

 

By Abe

The National Organization of Women (NOW) wrote in “A Maddening Reminder,” “On Dec. 27, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, former prime minister of Pakistan, robbed the world of a charismatic and dedicated advocate for democracy in the Middle East. The news was horrific, but hardly surprising given the numerous death threats Bhutto had received over the years.

In 1988 Prime Minister Bhutto became the first woman democratically elected to lead a modern Muslim nation, and repeatedly put her life on the line to advance democracy in a volatile country. Bhutto knew the risk that came with returning to Pakistan to run for a third term, but she refused to let that threat stand in her way. She was prepared to pay the ultimate price for freedom, and she did.” 

            The rest of the article by NOW President Kim Gandy makes little mention of Bhutto, but instead uses her assassination as a reminder that violence and brutality is a tool of oppression against women everywhere.