The day I declare all women beautiful AGAIN, or why I will not EVER back down.

An open letter to those who think sexism is dead and the darn feminists need to stop being so angry:

I haven't been blogging much lately, so when I noticed that I was getting a lot of page views, and a few really angry comments, I was curious. The majority were from a web site called Single Dude Travel, which seemed odd, since I'm not single, nor a dude, nor do I write about travel. Turns out, they had just linked to me because I'm a "retarded feminist." They said I was too much of a silly idiot woman to take on directly, but they linked to an article that did. I will not link to them here, because they don't deserve the attention. But basically their response to my argument against fat-shaming was that I'm a fat lesbian, so OF COURSE I feel that way. From there, I found a link to an article that argued that women are not fit to participate in the public sphere (seriously!!!), and they used my blog post as a prime example--apparently, I'm too emotional to tell people they're ugly or obese, so I make up pseudo-arguments to make myself feel better. I shouldn't quote this guy, because he does not deserve the attention, but I have to, because I cannot make this shit up (Grey is the guy who called me a fat lesbian, and when the author refers to Feministing, he's talking about my post, not the whole site):

Grey’s argument was perfectly sound, but in a sense his engagement with Feministing is pointless. The author of the original post is a woman. Of course she’s going to say absurd things in order to ensure that no one feels bad. We should accept that. Often we ought to praise women for their sensitivities while ignoring their so-called arguments.

It's the ovaries. They give me the crazies. (Also, I love that he tries to make that seem like a compliment...?) Oh, but the problem with this logic is that I AM cool with making some people feel bad...like people who think I'm too emotional to participate in the public sphere... However, if he STILL feels that I am "hysterical," he could always send me a vibrator--I hear they used to use those to cure the "womb crazies" and stuff--I would gladly accept such, uh, medication for my "problem."

But my point is, people say these things. Maybe not to your face, because you said nothing to provoke them. Or maybe because they're scared. Or maybe you thought what they said was a joke. But it's not. As much as I laughed at what these guys said about me, this is not a joke. This is serious. PEOPLE STILL THINK WOMEN SHOULD NOT PARTICIPATE IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE. THIS IS REAL. It's extreme, I know. Most of you will be like, "But I support women working!" But, just as problematically, PEOPLE STILL USE FAT LESBIAN AS AN INSULT. And that's a mainstream opinion.

On the one hand, I kind of feel like I earned a badge of honour. I mean, you hear of feminists being accused of being lesbians all the time--you know, the whole we're-too-ugly-to-actually-get-a-guy thing, the we're-bitter-angry-ugly-lesbians thing--but no one had ever said that to me! I was feeling kind of left out. Now I can join the club. Interestingly, I actually find it highly problematic that I've never been called a lesbian before. Because that says a lot more about what a lesbian can't be than it does about me. I don't get called a lesbian because most people that I've engaged with in arguments about feminism have seen what I look like. I'm thin. I have long dirty blonde hair. I wear a bra and girly tops and tight jeans or short shorts or skirts and I have a lot of pretty, impractical shoes. I put on mascara and lip gloss daily. I have long nails and I shave my legs. I'm young and white and conventionally attractive. By not calling me a lesbian, people are essentially saying that the only women who are lesbians are those who do not fit into heteronormative beauty standards. They are saying that if you're deemed "fuckable" by men, then there's no way you could refuse the penis! But all these guys online know is that I'm "getting all emotional" about the "fat chicks" and their "feelings" so I must be a lesbian. A fat one, too. Sorry, sweethearts, I'm actually not a lesbian--I don't refuse all penis, just yours, you misogynistic fuckwads. (Come on, call me a slut now--I dare you.)

But, on the other hand, telling me (or, no, sorry, telling men behind my back) that my voice does not belong in the public sphere? You better be prepared for what you've started. I have never been more motivated to put my voice out there. Oh, and I'm a PhD student, too, or I will be in a few months, so you better believe that I have the avenues to do so. I will stir shit up. I'm only just getting started. You think that one blog post was something? I wrote that rant in twenty minutes. I never expected it to go viral; I was writing it for the hundred-odd friends and family that usually read my blog. You just wait and see what I can do when I actually put my mind to it. You will not break me.

Sincerely,

The thin white straight girl who STILL believes that ALL WOMEN ARE BEAUTIFUL

This is what a feminist looks like.

The day I wrote about bodies again, or why our bodies are not the enemies of our "authentic," inner selves.

As I'm sure many of you have as well (depending on what demographic your computer thinks you belong to, I suppose...), I have seen this ad pop up on various web sites I've visited over the last little while:

Usually the image is accompanied by a flashing line of text proclaiming: "53-year-old woman looks 18!" or something along those lines. Obviously it's ridiculous. Obviously no anti-aging cream is going to be able to scrape your age off and show the inner 18-year-old that was hiding underneath. Obviously this is just one of those absurd ads that pop up when you visit web sites to illegally stream TV shows...at least this is better than the fake Facebook chats with the teenage girls with giant boobs, amiright?

But this image got under my skin. (No pun intended...heh.) The message it conveys is not only that being--or, more specifically, looking like--an aging woman is inappropriate or gross or something that needs to be fixed, but also that underneath our inappropriate, gross bodies is an "ideal" person, a person we can identify with, that's just waiting for us to take control of our unruly bodies and let her out! A divide is created between the body and the person within.

Advertisements and images like these employ the rhetoric of celebrating inner beauty and people's "real," admirable identities, but they paradoxically are still focused solely on physical appearance, and on modifying your physical appearance to match your "authentic self." Old people are told to reveal their inner 20-year-olds, fat people are told to let their inner thin person out, as if their grotesque bodies were hiding their authentic, ideal, heterosexually desirable and properly "controlled" selves somewhere under the soft, deep wrinkles and rolls of fat. This is not teaching us to celebrate our inner selves. This is teaching us to hate our bodies, to fear our desires and appetites and our need to consume, to expand, to expel, to decay and to rot.

We need to talk about what it means to live in a body in a culture that tells us we can rise above our bodies and leave them behind, that we are somehow "better" than our bodies, that if we try hard enough we can modify our bodies to look 20 when we're 53 or to be a 36-24-36 no matter what size we started out at. We need to have this conversation because we can't do these things. And we will fail, our bodies will fail, over and over again.

This is not a post to tell you that you need to come to terms with your body in its "natural" state, that you need to love your body and accept your body as it is and everything will be sunshine and rainbows and we'll all live happily ever after. I was criticized by a few people about my previous post on "body image" and "real" women because they felt that I was suggesting that everyone should find all bodies beautiful all the time. Although I can see where those people were coming from (particularly if they were not differentiating between "finding someone beautiful" and "being sexually attracted to someone," which is a whole other discussion to be had), I am not that idealistic, nor am I against body modification, which is what that interpretation of my argument seems to suggest.  Rather, I think we need to have a more nuanced conversation about body modification, one that finds a middle ground between "do it to let your inner self out!" (or the super individualistic "do it because you want to and no one can tell you your choices are wrong!") and "never ever do it or you'll be a slave to the patriarchy!" We need to open up the floor for a more complex discussion regarding what it means to have a body, to live in a body, to be a body, to find pleasure in a body, in this culture. We are past a point of being able to be wholly "natural," but that doesn't mean we should employ every technology possible to force our bodies into some sort of cultural "ideal." These "ideal selves" are not our ideal bodies; becoming these ideals, or looking like these ideals, if it is even possible, will not make us better, happier human beings. We need to create a space where we can be at home in our bodies, where we can find pleasure in our bodies, where we can be our bodies and not be divided from them. This, in my mind, is not antithetical to body modification, although it does require a new language for talking about body modification, one that isn't centred on "perfecting" the body or disciplining the body to reveal your authentic self. Feminist philosopher Cressida Heyes (whose work gave me the framework to articulate how I was feeling about the image at the beginning of this post) argues in her book Self-Transformations: Foucault, Ethics, and Normalized Bodies that we need an "alternative language for interpreting one’s own body" that doesn't place our "identities" in opposition or competition with our bodies. She advocates for embodied pleasure, for "a way of being in the world that requires active cultivation, against forces that would domesticate and normalize any possibility of experience that deviates from practices usually considered to be the proper sources of happiness or joy," and I am so with her on that.

The day I declare all women BEAUTIFUL, or why YOU are beautiful, full stop.

So here's the thing. This picture that's been circulating around Facebook...

...is BULLSHIT. (When did this become a blog about shitty pictures that get spread around Facebook? Oh well. I'll roll with it.) I know that not everyone who has posted this has been all "OMG THIS IS SO EFFING TRUE LOVE YOUR BODY <33333333" and that many people have used it as a jumping-off point for more critical discussion about fat shaming and such, so if you did post this, please don't think that I'm personally criticizing you. I just felt the need to jump in on this discussion. Because I get that SOME PARTS of this message need to get out there. I understand that Western society needs to understand that the average woman is a size 16, not between a size 4 and 12, and it is absolutely absurd that the fashion industry continues to dismiss the majority of women by employing "plus-size" models that are, in actuality, smaller than the average woman, and relegating women's clothing over a size 12 to speciality "plus-size" stores, meaning that most women cannot shop in "regular" stores. And that is absolute bullshit.

However, other parts of the message promoted by this image are EXTREMELY problematic. First of all, it kind of seems to be promoting the idea to women that it's okay to be a little bit bigger than your "ideal" size because men are okay with it. I'm sorry, did I miss the meeting where we decided that men get a say in how women feel about their bodies? 'Cause I'm not on board. My confidence in my body will NOT depend on whether on not the majority of dudes think I'm fuckable.

Second, putting aside the  dress sizes of these women for a moment, all three of these women fit conventional Western beauty norms. Long hair (windblown, too!), clear skin, no body hair, no cellulite, no wrinkles...and it appears as if all of their breast-waist-hip ratios fit the so-called ideal. Note that on the size 16 model, her waist is noticeably narrower than her hips, and her breasts stick out much more than her stomach. As one Facebook commenter astutely pointed out: "I actually think they're all beautiful - and I don't think that EVERYONE's beautiful." My point exactly. What if the "national average" woman had smaller breasts? What if she carried her weight more in her stomach area than in her breasts, hips and butt? What if you could see cellulite on her thighs? What if she hadn't shaved her legs or pubic area? What if she shaved her head? What if she had a unibrow? What if she had visible scarring? What if she had acne? What if the skin on her arms sagged, what if her breasts sagged, what if she was wrinkled? What if she was over thirty? What if her skin was darker? Would you still fill the comments section under this photo on Facebook with "OMG SHE'S NOT FAT SHE'S SO BEAUTIFUL!" She's beautiful because her appearance fits our cultural understanding of beautiful--and that does not include being fat, hence the tendency to say, "she's not fat, she beautiful," as if the two were antithetical. Hey, guess what--saying, "she's not fat, she's beautiful," is STILL FAT SHAMING because you're saying that if she were fat, she would NO LONGER BE BEAUTIFUL.

This leads me to my third point: the largest woman in this picture is only the (American, I'm assuming) NATIONAL AVERAGE. Which means that a large percentage of the population is bigger than the woman on the right. What about those women? They're not "ideal" nor "average" and therefore they are left out of the conversation? There are beautiful size 18, size 20, size 24 and beyond women. But we cannot talk about that because then we'd be forced to admit that women CAN be beautiful AND fat. Because, guess what--some women ARE fat. And that's fine. And that's beautiful. But this photo, like most of our conversations about body image and body acceptance, refuses to go there. And that's a problem.

My fourth and final point is that while this photo does open up the discussion around "average"/"plus-size" women's beauty, it also opens up a space to critique the bodies of women who fall into the size-8-and-below category. One commenter explicitly said, "I would NOT want to look like the chick on the left." That's totally fine--I don't want to look like someone that's not me either--but the implication is that she looks sickly, she's unattractive, she's anorexic, she's not a "real" woman because "real women have curves" or whatever. I am not trying to suggest here that the positive body image movement (or whatever you want to call it) is like "reverse fat shaming" or anything ridiculous like that. That would be like claiming that because I'm a Hanson fan I understand what it's like to be the victim of homophobia because when I "come out" to people as a Hanson fan I am usually openly criticized for my preferences and asked a bunch of idiotic questions about why I like them and whether or not I'm sure I like them and that it's not just some side effect of a childhood trauma that has made me incapable of maturing past Hanson fandom. (I have to admit, I went to a Hanson concert last night--but creative analogy, right?) Queer-identified people are faced with systemic oppression and homophobia, whereas Hanson fans are ridiculed but it has no lasting impact on their lives nor does it inhibit their access to any aspect of daily life. Similarly, fat women are faced with a lovely combination of fat-shaming and misogyny, whereas thin women have a lot of thin privilege, and when other women criticize them or call them "anorexic" or tell them to "eat a burger," it may hurt, but it does not limit their access to, well, anything, really. Being too small to shop in "plus-size" stores is not a systemic issue. However, it is still problematic to open up a space where insulting thin women for being thin is acceptable and it is highly problematic to suggest that any woman is not a "real" woman. For more on this topic, go here and read Kate Bartolotta's take on this (she actually looks at another hugely problematic photo that's been circulating around Facebook lately and that more explicitly insults skinny women). And I'm serious. Go read it. I just spent like 15 minutes looking through my browser history to find that link. Anyway, this photo should NOT be used as an excuse to tell any woman that she is not real or that her body is somehow offending those attempting to cultivate positive body image. A woman's confidence in her own body should not come about comparatively--whether it's comparing her body to the national average, to what men deem fuckable, or to what other women's bodies look like. And keep in mind what I said earlier--all of the women in this photo fit OTHER standards of beauty. The woman on the left is conventionally attractive in ways that other skinny/thin women are not. Also, she is quite tall, so she is much thinner than most women who fit into the size 4 to 8 category (I doubt this was an accident--the taller she is, the skinnier and more "sickly" a size 4 to 8 looks). Not that I am suggesting that this is a problem--she is beautiful. The message is not.

The day I was feminist enough, or why refreshing, rethinking and redefining feminism can be a disaster or it can be AWESOME.

So I was going to write a post about family and the holidays and all that stuff as my first post back from vacation but then last night I stumbled upon this website and I decided to write about it instead.

The website is called "I'm Feminist Enough..." and it currently features three videos of women finishing that sentence. Like "I'm feminist enough not to judge other women" or "I'm feminist enough to  paint my nails before I go camping." Shannon Washington, the creator of the site, was inspired (or provoked) by Beyonce's comment in an interview sometime in 2011. When asked if she was a feminist, Beyonce said:

I don’t really feel that it’s necessary to define it. It’s just something that’s kind of natural for me, and I feel like…you know…it’s, like, what I live for.... I need to find a catchy new word for feminism, right? Like Bootylicious.

Washington found this rather troubling. What's wrong with feminism? But Washington says that for "many women of color, especially young women, the word 'feminist' provokes an image that is antiquated, overtly-aggressive, anti-male and white." (You have NO IDEA how much it pains me to write "color" instead of "colour" when I'm quoting someone American.) But, uh, to me, "bootylicious" provokes a highly sexualized image of women. Something new and different! (That was sarcasm...) So Washington decided that it was time to rethink and refresh feminism, specifically for women of colour. (HA. Spelled it my way. Paraphrasing is super cool.) And thus "I'm Feminist Enough..." was born! Washington writes:

Using video and still imagery, the 'I’m Feminist Enough…' project seeks to visualize the fresh face of feminism and demonstrate to our young sisters (and brothers) the value of feminist thought in our daily lives in a manner that is simple, sexy, modern and easy. Yes, you can be a feminist but get a kick out having the door held open for you. These actions don’t define your place as a woman, you do.

Awesome. But this isn't just a post advertising this site (although it kind of is...). I have some thoughts about it.

Obviously, I am not a woman of colour (well, actually I suppose that wasn't obvious until right now since you can't see me...), and I want to start by saying that in no way am I attempting to speak on behalf of anyone else. Feminism has not always been kind of women of colour, and it still isn't (remember some of the incidents at Slutwalk?), and I acknowledge that and in no way want to excuse that. However, I do want to think about what feminism means and what movements like this one that "refresh" feminism are doing. This website sparked ideas that I've been thinking about for a long time, so I'm taking my ideas and running with them, but I do not mean to erase the really fucking important shit that Washington is addressing when she talks about redefining feminism for women of colour. 

So I think I could look at this "I'm Feminist Enough..." movement one of two ways. First of all, the cynical way. I could say that these videos are promoting the idea that as long as a woman (or man or anyone else) calls herself a "feminist," then everything she does, from shaving her head to paying her own bills to running a company to painting her nails before going on a camping trip, is a feminist or radical act. And I have a problem with that. Because unless you discover some radical, transgressive way to paint your nails, painting them is not really a feminist act in the sense that it is furthering the cause of feminism. It may be a feminist act in the literal sense that a feminist is doing it. But painting your nails is conforming to the patriarchal definition of femininity. (I don't really know where it started, but my guess is women weren't just born with this natural urge to have pink nails.) BUT. BUT. NO. Don't yell at me and tell me that you are not brainwashed just because you paint your nails. I KNOW THIS. I paint my nails too. (Sometimes. I have really long hard nails and therefore I use them as tools to open things and stuff so they chip really fast and it's annoying. But I paint my toenails a lot.) So yeah. I have a problem when people say that everything a woman does is a feminist act just because she's a woman so obviously she believes in her own equality so if she wants to get breast implants THEY'RE FEMINIST BREAST IMPLANTS BECAUSE NO MAN PHYSICALLY MADE HER DO IT. Uhhh...riiiiiiight. Because in no way are we taught from birth that breasts are purely sex toys for men. That's not something we grew up hearing AT ALL. That's why breastfeeding in public is not an issue at all! Because we haven't overly sexualized breasts! They're totally neutral vessels of baby food! And risking your life to make them bigger and likely also completely ineffective as vessels of baby food has NOTHING TO DO WITH MEN OR SEXISM AT ALL. (Sidenote: I am not saying that all women need to use their breasts as vessels of baby food and that if you don't procreate and breastfeed you fail as a woman. I am also not saying that all women who have breast implants are brainwashed by the patriarchy. I just got a bit carried away with my sarcasm. However, we live in a patriarchal society. And you can't just decide you're outside that and have that be the end of it.)

See? Ryan gets it.

However, I'm not convinced that is the message of "I'm Feminist Enough..." (Although it is the message of A LOT of things which is why I wanted to talk about it. For another totally awesome post on this subject by Meghan Murphy, look here. I totally quoted it in an essay I wrote. It's fun using blog posts as sources in essays. You get to swear and use caps lock a lot.) I want to look at "I'm Feminist Enough..." from another angle, an angle that a like I lot more. I think these videos promote the idea that a woman can be a feminist without having to make her every move a radical one so long as she is aware that many of her actions are not radical or even feminist. And the videos promote the idea that feminists do not have to feel guilty every time they do something slightly "unfeminist," like paint their nails. And sometimes, the "unfeminist" thing to do is the logical one. And sometimes even though it seems "unfeminist," it actually kind of isn't. One woman in the videos said that she's feminist enough to be the chef in her heterosexual relationship because she's the good cook and she's not going to eat her fiance's shitty food to prove a point. She's feminist enough to understand that feminists ARE PEOPLE. (WHOA! What a novel concept!) Feminism is not reversing gender roles. Feminism is not giving up things that make you happy. And feminism cannot be achieved by an individual. Because we're all going to mess up. Not one of us individually can be the perfect feminist. I fuck up. A lot. I like to use the word "bitch." I try not to do it in public too often. But it's fun to say! And no, it's not feminist when I do it. I am not reinventing the meaning of the word "bitch" when I use it as an insult. And sometimes I assume that most straight men think with their penises and that I can get what I want if I dress a certain way or behave a certain way. And that the men won't mind. That's really not feminist. That's manipulative and cruel.

But together, maybe feminists can get more done. We live in a culture that praises people for being individuals, for accomplishing things alone, but can't we get more done together? One of the women in the videos said that she's feminist enough not to judge other women. So if women (and men and everyone else) stop judging one another for their individual little fuck ups and instead focus on collectively working towards a goal (and also focus on LISTENING to one another WITHOUT GETTING DEFENSIVE when we kindly remind each other that maybe calling someone a pussy isn't exactly a feminist action...), maybe feminism still has a shot.

If I was making a video for "I'm Feminist Enough..." I would say, "I'm feminist enough to know that not every move I make is radical or even feminist. And I'm okay with my fuck ups. Because I'm human. But I'm also feminist enough to keep trying to fuck up less."

What would you say? As Shannon Washington said, "There is no right or wrong, just truth." If you want to get involved with the actual movement, and not just my discussion of it, you can find contact info on the "I'm Feminist Enough..." website.

The day before the day before, or why Africans do in fact know it's Christmas. (Hint: it's because they're not stupid! Whoa!)

I'm going to probably be taking at least a week off from blogging to celebrate the SWAGmas season with my lovely friends and family, but I thought I would write one more short post today. A few weeks ago, I wrote this post about the condescending racism hidden in the lyrics of Band Aid's "Do They Know Know It's Christmas?" Of course, Glee decided to perform the song a week or so later during their Christmas special. (Who else thinks they should have just foregone the plot for that episode--ha, like Glee has a discernible plot--and just aired a longer version of the black-and-white Christmas special? Because it rocked. Kurt and Blaine as "best friends and holiday roommates"? THE BEST.) Anyway, personally I found Glee's version of the song EVEN WORSE than Band Aid's version and I even had people who didn't really agree with my original analysis of the song say to me OMG HOW INSENSITIVE WAS THE GLEE VERSION?!?!?! Because, seriously, THEY SING THE SONG TO HOMELESS PEOPLE. They sing about how glad they are that they have charmed, privileged lives to people in a homeless shelter. "And tonight thank God it's them instead of you! Well, actually, it is you, SUCKERS." Last year they managed to make "Baby It's Cold Outside" sound a little less rape-y. But this year they made "Do They Know It's Christmas?" sound more condescending. Trying to achieve some twisted sort of balance?

Anyway, yesterday a friend of mine tagged me in a post on Facebook informing me of the existence of a response to "Do They Know It's Christmas?" by an ensemble of unemployed African musicians who have called themselves Plaster Cast (like Band Aid but tougher! Ahahaha...haha...ha.......). They call the song "Yes We Do." When asked why it took them well over 20 years to release a response to Band Aid's song, they said "it had taken a while ... to realise that it wasn't actually an elaborate joke." However, the group had always "been irked by [Bob] Geldof's assumption that hungry Africans were also stupid" and that "despite the poverty and hunger that had inspired Geldof and his friends to create the song back in 1984 that Africans had developed their own ways to remember Christmas." Interestingly enough, people DON'T need to be inundated with Christmas-themed commercials starting in October to realize that Christmas is coming! Weird, eh? The proceeds of Plaster Cast's song "will go towards teaching discipline, literacy and contraception at British schools." The article about the song from Hayibo.com, where I got all this information from, can be found here.

Alright, time to make my way back to my parents' house to officially get SWAGmas started! Merry Christmas and SWAGmas or happy holidays or happy getting-paid-extra-for-working-on-a-holiday or happy weekend or just happy time! Yay! Enjoy!

In conclusion, here's an adorable picture of the Biebs and his three-year-old sister on stage during his Christmas special Home for the Holidays:

Awwwww. See you in 2012!!!

The day I realized there won't be snow in Orange County this Christmas, or why Bob Geldof, Bono and Sting badly need anti-oppression training.

Sorry it's been a while, but I've been writing term papers. So. Much. Writing. Le sigh. But I get to hand in two of them tomorrow! Only one more to write. For Monday. Wahhhhhhhhhhhh I just want to watch Christmas movies...and Pretty in Pink. I don't know why, but I have a sudden urge to watch every Molly Ringwald movie I can get my hands on. Jimmifer and I watched The Breakfast Club last weekend. It was glorious. Except I'm still confused about why it's called The Breakfast Club. Like, Brian signs that letter from "the Breakfast Club" but they never decide that that's their name and they don't even eat breakfast together. Weird.

Anyway, as promised, I will now answer the question: WTF is with that Band Aid song "Do They Know It's Christmas?"? Well, I can't promise a definite answer. But I will demonstrate how it is completely bizarre and hugely problematic and just kind of rude.

Now, I am fairly tolerant of the lyrical content of Christmas music. I will sing along regardless of what the words are. And usually, I don't really pay attention to what the words are, possibly because I learned the words when I was too young to fully comprehend their meaning. Or possibly because I'm not actually Christian and don't really want to bother thinking about the fact that I sing loudly about Jesus for about a month every year. I learned the other day while singing along to "Mistletoe and Wine" that I've been singing "children singing crispy and white" instead of "children singing Christian rhymes" and never questioned it. Because, you know, CRISPY AND WHITE CHILDREN aren't something I should be concerned about. Nevermind that it sounds kind of racist, but WHY ARE THEY CRISPY??

Anyway, my point is that it's rare that I will find a Christmas song problematic, mostly due to my own willful ignorance of the words. But while decorating our SWAGmas tree and listening to "Do They Know It's Christmas?", I suddenly became conscious of the words I was singing. (Also, I just noticed that I have three copies of this song in my iTunes. WHY?!?!) What first caught my attention was the line: "There won't be snow in Africa this Christmas time." Well, no shit, Sherlock. (Not that I am up on the climate of the entire continent of Africa. Maybe some parts get snow. I don't know what time of year it would snow there, though...) Since when is a lack of snow at Christmas a cause for concern? I mean, sure, snow at Christmas is pretty, but that's a pretty geographically limited view of Christmas. Lots of places don't get snow at Christmas, like California. And Australia. And Mexico. Should we be sending aid to Orange County this Christmas? Plus, if life in Africa is as destitute and awful as this song suggests, I think snow might make it worse. Snow means cold. Cold means people freeze to death.

And then this line is followed by the line: "The greatest gift they'll get this year is life." You know what, that sounds like a pretty awesome gift to me. If I could pick ONE THING to get for Christmas, that would probably be it. I hope that everyone gets life for Christmas this year. Please survive Christmas, readers. It would mean a lot to me. (I understand that Band Aid is implying that their needs beyond the basic need of survival are not being met, but come on. That's a stupid way of phrasing it.)

And then it just gets absolutely generalizing and patronizing. Like, not EVERYONE in Africa is homeless, starving and dying. Some of them might actually have radios and CD players and computers and other music-listening devices! So some of them might hear you (I'm looking at you, Bono. I know you sang this line.) sing, "So tonight thank God it's them instead of you." Okay, really? That's insulting. "I'm so glad I don't live in Africa!" Shut up, Bono. And I may not be Christian, but I'm PRETTY SURE the purpose of prayer is not to be like, "Hey, God, thanks for making other people's lives shitty and not mine!"

And then there's the whole thing where they sing, "Where nothing ever grows / No rain or river flows," and then Sting chimes in and is all like, "Where the only water flowing is the bitter sting of tears," which I'm pretty sure he said just so he could say his own name. But like, generalizations much? (And emo much, Sting? Srsly.) The entire continent of Africa is not completely dry. There's like this river...the NILE. It's pretty effing huge. And I see other bits of blue on the map. (Dear lord my knowledge of geography is pitiful...at least I know the blue on the maps equals water, right?) So if you're going to talk about desert-like conditions, maybe you should do your research and talk about the ACTUAL PARTS OF AFRICA that suffer from drought. I'm not pretending like I know exactly where they are, either, but I'M NOT SINGING A SONG ABOUT IT, AM I?

And then there's the best part! The repeated line: "Do they know it's Christmas time at all?" ARE THEY CHRISTIAN? IS EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN AFRICA CHRISTIAN? It's likely that many of the Christian people living in Africa KNOW VERY WELL THAT IS CHRISTMAS. And the lack of snow is probably not keeping them from being aware of this, FYI. Do you think it's Christmas every time it snows? No, no you do not. So the snow thing really has nothing to do with it. Anyway, if they don't know it's Christmas, it might very well have something to do with the fact that they aren't Christian. And if they are Christian and don't know it's Christmas, then yes, that's sad. But still. Your song is stupid. And it creates this weird us/them dichotomy that I am really not comfortable with.

(I'll let you in on a secret, Bob Geldof: People in Africa...they're people too! And they can hear you. So stop referring to them as if they can't. It's creepy and weird, like when parents talk about their kids in front of their kids...like "Ryan is being difficult these days and refuses to wear pants or eat his vegetables" and nine-year-old Ryan is standing right there with all his friends and now is embarrassed because everyone knows he doesn't wear pants at home and is "difficult"...except that this is worse, because you're talking about a whole continent of people like they can't hear you. And granted, some of them can't. But it's still not cool to talk behind people's backs. Especially, you know, when the people from your continent have this history of being really racist and violent towards people from their continent because they think people from Africa are inferior to them...you know, like they're children or animals or something. And you kind of sound like you think they're inferior, like children or something...hmmm.)

In conclusion, I love writing blog posts because I can write "and then ... and then ... and then ... and then" without getting docked marks. (Seriously, four of my paragraphs in this post start with "and then.") Take that, term papers!