Category: Ladybusiness

Ladybusiness

International Women’s Day

Shelly

So. Tomorrow is International Women’s Day. One whole Day! Just for us ladypeople! Google is, of course, celebrating with a Google doodle. And of course, some dude was interviewed about its creation. He says, and I fucking quote: “International Women’s Day is a really hard topic. How do you [summarize] what women represent in a graphic?”

Jesus wept.

Texas is celebrating by further restricting access to abortion. Why? Because they care. Mm-hm. It seems to me that if they actually gave one single solitary fuck about women’s health and safety, they would accept the fact that pregnancy is far more dangerous to women than abortion. But they don’t, so they won’t.

Crankypantsing, Ladybusiness, News & Politics

This day. I just don’t even.

Shelly

First, from the ACLU blog, if you’re a girl in Delhi, Louisiana and you are even suspected of being pregnant, you lose your rights to bodily autonomy and privacy. You must submit to a pregnancy test. If you refuse, you will be kicked out of school. If you take the test and are pregnant, you will be kicked out of school.

This, after a “quote in a box” image that circulated on Facebook over the weekend, stating that pregnant teens need an ass whipping. Because child abuse will solve EVERYTHING.

This world is not a safe place for women, and it’s an even less safe place for girls.

Second, this world is also not a safe place for brown people. My heart goes out to the Sikh community. I am sorry an entitled, racist, hate-filled white dude had access to guns. I’m sorry that racist news media has made a business out of spreading misinformation and intolerance, adding fuel to the fire of would-be terrorists like Wade Michael Page. I’m sorry.

Third, I’m sick to death of smug “christians” who insist that it’s Just Fine to hate the sin as long as they don’t hate the sinner. They frame it as “disagreeing with” homosexuality. As if it’s just a differing of opinions. They call it a “lifestyle choice.” As if being straight were a “lifestyle choice.” They claim that it’s possible to disagree with someone’s choices, but still love that person. Well, that’s bullshit, and it’s beneath contempt. Being gay is not a fashion choice. It’s not something you can just decide to stop being. It’s an integral, interwoven part of you. JUST LIKE BEING STRAIGHT is. So when you say that you hate homosexuality, you ARE, in fact, saying that you HATE gays. HATE. And last time I checked, Jesus said we should love our neighbors, not hate them. You can’t have it both ways.

Fourth, I’m pretty well over all the ignorant, bigoted assholes who think everyone is being a big meanypants to Chick-fil-a, just because the company’s president exercised his freedom of speech. “Waaah! You must tolerate our intolerance!” This was not about freedom of speech. This was about a company that funnels millions of dollars to hate groups like the Family Research Council and pray-away-the-gay groups like Exodus International. Why would anyone with a shred of human decency give a penny to them, knowing where that money is going to go? So fuck you, Dan Cathy, and fuck the horse you rode in on, and fuck all the hate-mongering “christians” who line up to eat your bigot chicken knowing full well that they’re supporting HATE.

Ladybusiness, Photography

The Sky Is Falling

Shelly

I spent an hour in the basement, hiding from tornadoes. When I came upstairs, the sky was still doing impressive things.

Sky

Usually I’m the only one down there. This time, there was a young woman with her dog and toddler camped out on the other end of the basement. A little later, her husband joined them. I listened to them talking about the recent spate of pro-forced-birth legislation across the country. They discussed requiring women to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound before getting an abortion, and the husband said, “That’s battery!”

I hate storms and I hate being stuck in the basement, hiding from them, but it was nice to be reminded that there are reasonable people in this world and that some of them are my neighbors.

In other news, I ordered some cheap-assed glasses online. They’re leopard print. I’ll report back when I get them. (And seriously, I mean cheap. I paid US$11.90 for them.)

Art, Collage, Ladybusiness

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

Shelly

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

There’s been a spate of goddess worshipping in one of my feminist groups. I tend to be turned off by that, but whatever. If some women need to feel like their ladybits are holy and magical, that’s their problem, right? But then, when I said that I wasn’t too interested in the contemporary, new agey spiritual appropriation of medieval “goddess” sculptures, I was scolded and told that my negative reaction was due to the fact that I’m uncomfortable with my vagina.

The entire exchange reminded me of the ancient and still thriving theory that women’s irrationality is caused by their ladybits. Specifically their wandering uteruses. Which then made me think of that famous quote from The Lord of the Rings. My point being, that if my uterus and I are wandering, it’s likely for good reason. We ladypeople are righteously angry about something. It’s not PMS. It’s not fear and loathing of our bodies. It’s a reasonable and rational response to the world we live in.

I mean, how could we not be pissed off?

Cemeteries, Ladybusiness, Photography

Hellenea Clark and Pamellia Barlow

Shelly


Source: Lilly Library, Frank M. Hohenberger Photograph Collection – “Graves of Wm. Couper’s wives, Aug. 29, 1910, 10:30 a.m. She was/but words are wanting to say what/Think what a wife should be/and she was that/.”

I’m starting a fun project at work, adding metadata to a collection of old photographs by Frank M. Hohenberger. The bulk of the photos were taken in this area, so they’re of local historical interest. I couldn’t resist searching for cemeteries and graves, and when I did, this one jumped out at me. The “title” comes directly from Hohenberger’s journals, so we have only him to blame for the fact that William Couper‘s wives were only significant for the fact that they were married to him. They apparently did not merit their own names. And look at how young they were when they died! Hellenea was 28 and Pamellia just 23.