Sarah Kerton

I’ve been reflecting on World Mental Health day, as I lie in bed with the tail end of the Fresher’s lurgy and, in the interests of honesty and topicalness, while feeling quite low too. This year’s theme is depression, a problem that is very close to my heart, having suffered in some form or another since I was 15 years old, and loving many people who do too. The combination of a month or so of various stresses, and little to no sleep due to my susceptibility to undergraduate germs, has knocked me off kilter and upset the very careful balance of structure and order in my life that keeps me mentally well. I’m not going to say much more than that, but even typing those few sentences makes me feel exposed and like I’m oversharing. This is one of the stigmas of mental illness. There’s no shame in sharing with you that my lungs feel like they’ve lost a fight with a cheese grater, and that when I breathe I sound like Darth Vader in an echo chamber, but the moment some element of our mental and psychic wellness comes into play, so flows in the quite understandable fears and doubts that pervade such an illness.

The sense of panic that many feel when sharing experiences of mental illness is not without a basis in reality. I could reel off a ton of micro aggressions from friends and family when discussing or responding to my depression. From the ‘helpful’ attempts to rationalise illness - “come on, pull yourself together”, “it’s not ALL bad!”, “there are people much worse off than you, you know”, through to the ignorant and ill-thought-out, “well, I just think anti-depressants are a cop out” - what these responses share in common is a failure to recognise that mental illness exists as a very real and actual experience. Depression is as real as the pain in my chest, the swelling of my glands (another Freshers’ scar - mumps from my first year of teaching leaves me chimpmunk-like at the sight of a virus…) and the Darth Vader impressions.

I feel like I’m perhaps wasting my breath though, because people DO seem to engage with the rhetoric, and yet far less often do their actions match their words. There are lots of hashtags, lots of well meaning posts, well organised events and socials that all aim to bring forms of awareness to the day, and ostensibly to mental health itsself. Yet, I do wonder if people who engage in this, retweet some Stephen Fry, and wholeheartedly throw their support behind a facebook viral about how depression means you’re actually stronger than the ‘average person’ (does it? I think it just means you suffer from depression…), see depression and mental health as something ‘over there’, that happens to ‘other people’, to famous celebrities that we can all chat about and feel some form of empathy for.

It doesn’t. It happens right here. It happens to your friends, to your families, in your communities. It’s the friend who is the life and soul of the party (not because of their depression, just because they are!) for months on end and then disappears from the scene without anyone really noticing. It’s the lad who you really enjoy gossiping with after your lecture who doesn’t turn up in the second semester. It’s your flatmate who is leaving their washing up whilst not leaving their room. It is all around you, and often, we close our eyes to it. Maybe its because we don’t see it? Maybe we don’t want it to become our problem? Maybe its because, in actuality, dealing with someone who is having a bad time mentally IS seen as a burden?

If you do just one thing on World Mental Health day, don’t make it retweeting a quote. Don’t make it hashtagging some profound comment on disability. Pick up the phone to someone, or send a text. Tell someone that you love and care about that you love them, and you care about them. That you’re there to support them if they’re feeling down, and then - do it. It doesn’t take much. A soft word, a hand on a shoulder, watching a horrendous Rom-Com and sharing some sickly sweets… Just a text message to let someone know that you’re there can make the biggest of differences for someone who is feeling emotionally stranded and broken. Even if you suffer from depression yourself, ESPECIALLY if you do - because you should get it, more than anyone. I’m going to send a text right now, and I hope anyone reading this does too.

TW: Rape, domestic abuse, bodily mutilation, awful things…

When Mitt Romney makes comments about magical vaginas that can fight off unwanted sperm at a thousand paces, my Facebook explodes in unified uproar - we don’t like his politics, so we can be damned sure it’s fine to be outraged at his abhorrent attitudes towards women’s reproductive rights. When Chris Brown’s new album marketing is extensively defaced and vandalised, the results shared across the internet for the waiting Lefties to retweet and tumble, we clap with glee - we don’t like his music, so we can be damned sure we’re able to become suitably incensed at his treatment of women. But James Brown! What a legend! Bob Marley, John Lennon - they’re the greats, amiright?! There’s a touch of this complicated arrangement going on with our current discussions on No Platform.

Two heroes of certain factions of ‘The Left’ have said some pretty abhorrent stuff about rape. About women’s rights to assume that if they’re asleep, they’re not consenting to sex. About how ‘Rape Rape’ is a problem - you know, ‘rape rape’, the stuff that happens in alleys and is always taken seriously, not ‘kinda rape’, the stuff that happens in bed with a guy you invited into your house and I mean what did you expect if you invited him into your house, that doorway is just a free pass to your vagina rape etc etc. Abhorrent, disgusting stuff. But then what happened…

… not a lot of much. A silence descended across the land of ‘The Left’. As if a giant swooping searchlight had caught them redhanded sneaking out of their bedroom window on their way to listen to Mark E Smith drone on about women hating after a bit of afternoon wife beating, ‘The Left’ went a bit quiet really. How do you handle your heroes saying something utterly disgusting?

You could be a bit like the NUS Women’s Campaign. Julie Bindel, long time respected radical feminist, a woman who has done some blindingly amazing work advocating for women who are victims of domestic violence, said some pretty disgusting stuff about trans* issues, in a 2004 column. Julie was subsequently disowned, no platformed and rightfully shunned. To this day, myself and many other feminists like me refuse to engage with or attend events where the brand of feminism on show is a transphobic one. It’s not always easy - there are plenty of amazing conferences that I’ve missed because of a transphobic keynote, or a “woman born woman” type policy - but my principles say that if you exclude one of my sisters, then I have no choice but to stand with them outside of your bigoted spaces.

There’s no doubt that some of our acceptance and highlighting of transphobic brands of feminism has in turn hurt feminism as a construct, in as far as the eyes of some can see. We could have easily indulged in a bit of fire fighting and loudly shouted over our bigoted ‘comrades’ going, NOTHING TO SEE HERE - or perhaps derailed a conversation about how a feminist claiming that, “a man who chops off his penis is still a man” is just the most disgusting thing ever by talking about domestic violence rates, or female genital mutilation in Egypt and the ‘real’ violence that is committed against human beings - and we could have successfully stopped some people seeing theis feminism for what it really is, but that wouldn’t have helped. Not really. It wouldn’t have stopped the fact that those feminists were and are bigoted and transphobic. It wouldn’t have changed the impact that has on our trans* siblings; all it would have done is made us complicit.

I’m no fan of No Platform as a tool of political control. As far as ‘free speech’ goes, in controlled debate, I’m keen to see an idiot brought down a peg by an excellent remark. But we don’t live in a controlled environment, and that can never really happen. We are all empowered with different levels of political engagement, with different weight to our voices and our actions, and in that we flounder or prosper. For me, No Platform is about safety, and its about empowerment. Speaking from my own political perspectives - if I really want to show to my black sisters that their presence is lacking and missing in my women’s campaigns, I have to stand by them in their struggles. I have to give them space not just to lead their ‘own’ struggle, but find themselves at the table that excludes them, steering it alongside all types and variations of women collectively. I’m not going to do that by playing down the impact - emotionally, physically and politically - that protecting the voices of racist bigots has. If I want an LGBT campaign which truely offers my trans* siblings a space to find their voice, I’m shutting that down immediately by telling them that Julie Bindel’s right to abuse them must be put to one side because of her work on women’s shelters.

It’s easy enough to throw Nick Griffin in the pile with Chris Brown and Mitt Romney, to be mocked and ‘boycotted’ from the sidelines - let’s see you flyering about domestic violence at the next The Fall gig, and maybe we can talk about solidarity.

wertheyouth:

Check out this article on The Link about femme invisibility, being queer enough, facets of the femme, other general interesting topics!! Written by Jeannette Young. 

This is hugely problematic, particularly equating “femmephobia” with structural oppressions.

(via projectqueer)

I'll be fucking waiting.: “Let me tell you some things. I used to investigate child abuse and...

feminisminapapercup:

““Let me tell you some things. I used to investigate child abuse and neglect. I can tell you how to stop the vast majority of abortion in the world. First, make knowledge and access to contraception widely available. Start teaching kids before they hit puberty. Teach them about domestic violence and coercion, and teach them not to coerce and rape. Create a strong, loving community where women and girls feel safe and supported in times of need. Because guess what? They aren’t. You know what happens to babies born under such circumstances? They get hurt, unnecessarily. They get sick, unnecessarily. They get removed from parents who love them but who are unprepared for the burden of a child. Resources? Honey, we try. There aren’t enough resources anywhere. There are waiting lists, and promises, and maybes. If the government itself can’t hook people up, what makes you think an impoverished single mom can handle it? Abolish poverty. Do you have any idea how much childcare costs? Daycare can cost as much or more than monthly rent. They may be inadequately staffed. Getting a private nanny is a nice idea, but they don’t come cheap either. Relatives? Do they own a car? Does the bus run at the right times? Do they have jobs of their own they need to work just to keep the lights on? Are they going to stick around until you get off you convenience store shift at 4 AM? Do they have criminal histories that will make them unsuitable as caregivers when CPS pokes around? You gonna pay for that? Who’s going to pay for that? End rape. I know your type errs on the side of blaming the woman, but I’ve seen little girls who’ve barely gotten their periods pregnant because somebody thought raping preteens was an awesome idea. You want to put a child through that? Or someone with a mental or physical inability for whom pregnancy would be frightening, painful or even life-threatening? I’ve seen nonverbal kids who had their feet sliced up by caregivers for no fucking reason at all, you think sexual abuse doesn’t happen either? You say there’s lots of couples who want to adopt. Kiddo, what they want to adopt are healthy white babies, preferably untainted by the wombs and genetics of women with alcohol or drug dependencies. I’ve seen the kids they don’t want, who almost no one wants. You people focus only on the happy pink babies, the gigglers, the ones who grow and grow with no trouble. Those are not the kids who linger in foster care. Those are certainly not the older kids and teenagers who age out of foster care and then are thrown out in the streets, usually with an array of medical and mental health issues. Are they too old to count? And yeah, I’ve seen the babies, little hand-sized things barely clinging to life. There’s no glory, no wonder there. There is no wonder in a pregnant woman with five dollars to her name, so deep in depression you wonder if she’ll be alive in a week. Therapy costs money. Medicine costs money. Food, clothes, electricity cost money. Government assistance is a pittance; poverty drives women and girls into situations where they are forced to rely on people who abuse them to survive. (I’ve been up in more hospitals than I can count.) In each and every dark pit of desperation, I have never seen a pro-lifer. I ain’t never seen them babysitting, scrubbing floors, bringing over goods, handing mom $50 bucks a month or driving her to the pediatrician. I ain’t never seen them sitting up for hours with an autistic child who screams and rages so his mother can get some sleep while she rests up from working 14-hour days. I don’t see them fixing leaks in rundown houses or playing with a kid while the police prepare to interview her about her sexual abuse. They’re not paying for the funerals of babies and children who died after birth, when they truly do become independent organisms. And the crazy thing is they think they’ve already done their job, because the child was born! Aphids give birth, girl. It’s no miracle. You want to speak for the weak? Get off your high horse and get your hands dirty helping the poor, the isolated, the ill and mentally ill women and mothers and their children who already breathe the dirty air. You are doing nothing, absolutely nothing, for children. You don’t have a flea’s comprehension of injustice. You are not doing shit for life until you get in there and fight that darkness. Until you understand that abortion is salvation in a world like ours. Does that sound too hard? Do you really think suffering post-birth is more permissible, less worthy of outrage? “Pro-life” is simply a philosophy in which the only life worth saving is the one that can be saved by punishing a woman.”

Source!: http://desliz.tumblr.com/post/8944082875

Holy shit, this blew my mind. To say it so simply. Bluntly. It’s powerful.  And this is why I am pro-choice. 

So powerful.

(via autostraddle)

Amaze

(via ikatticus)

of a white woman who came to the group for Women of Color
only
her grief cut us into guilt while we clutched the straw
of this tiny square inch we have which we need
so desperately when we need so much more
We talked her into leaving
which took 10 minutes of our precious 60
Those legion white Lesbians whose feelings are hurt
because we have a Lesbians of Color Potluck
once a month for 2 hours
without them
Those tears of the straight woman
because we kicked out her boyfriend at the Lesbians only
poetry reading where no microphone was provided
& the room was much too small for all of us
shouting that we were imperialists
though I had spent 8 minutes trying to explain
to her that an oppressed people
cannot oppress their oppressor
She ignored me
charged into the room weeping & storming
taking up 9 minutes of our precious tiny square inch
Ah those tears
which could be jails, graves, rapists, thieves, thugs
those tears which are so puffed up with inappropriate grief
Those women who are used to having their tears work
rage at us
when they don’t
We are not real Feminists they say
We do not love women
I yell back with a wet face
_Where are our jobs? Our apartments?_
_Our voices in parliament or congress?_
_Where is our safety from beatings, from murder?_
_You cannot even respect us to allow us_
_60 uninterrupted minutes for ourselves_

Your tears are chains
Feminism is the right of each woman
to claim her own life her own time
her own interrupted 60 hours
60 days
60 years
No matter how sensitive you are
if you are white
you are
No matter how sensitive you are
if you are a man
you are
We who are not allowed to speak have the right
to define our terms our turf
These facts are not debatable
Give us our inch
& we’ll hand you a hanky

- Chrystos

fuckyeahgenderstudies:

letstalkaboutrape:

<3

Except that this infographic still suggests that rape is about sexual attraction, about being ‘turned on’—and it isn’t. So… </3.

(via fanniefierce)

sexistappeal:

[image: text written as in a primary school notebook, “consent in the sheets” and “dissent in the streets.”]

(via projectqueer)