Posts Tagged ‘Courtney Martin’
Friday Round Up: The Revolution Must Be Funded Edition
While there was plenty of political intrigue and sex scandal dominating the news this past
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week, the most provocative article I read was Courtney Martin’s “’You Are the NOW of Now!’ The Future of (Online) Feminism.”
Courtney, a leading young feminist writer and an editor of Feministing.com, last year
Read MoreThe Women’s Eye Sees the 9 Ways
Interview by Pamela Burke of The Woman’s Eye Blog: Gloria Feldt On 9 Ways To Embrace Your Power
29 DecGloria Feldt has a passion for bettering women’s lives. She’s a renowned activist, commentator, teacher, and author. In her early years as a mother of three living in west Texas, she called herself a “desperate housewife.” Yet she rose to find her voice as President and CEO of Planned Parenthood from 1996-2005.
“It’s up to us to develop a more positive relationship with power, to define power on our terms and embrace it…” Gloria Feldt
Her most recent book “No Excuses–9 Ways Women Can Change How We Think About Power” has been received with widespread praise. It’s been called “groundbreaking” and “attitude-changing,” and “the most daring.”
I’ve known Gloria for several years now and have attended her inspiring lectures. She’s certainly embraced her own power as her book is climbing best-seller lists. I am delighted I had the opportunity to ask Gloria how she finally found her own identity and to get her advice for others we begin 2011…
EYE: You’ve wrestled with finding your own voice throughout your life. Do you think the struggle is finally over?
Read MoreBack By Popular Demand: WomenGirlsLadies at UMKC
| WomenGirlsLadies made a return visit to UMKC last week, thanks to the invitation from Women’s Center Director Brenda Bethman. Rather than a single event, this year’s Starr Symposium featured a series of community conversations about the “Work/Life Balance in a Woman’s Nation. Deborah Siegel, Courtney Martin, Kristal Brent Zook, and I kicked off the event with our WomenGirlsLadies panel, where we provided intergenerational perspectives on work and life choices.
“Nobody loves you better because you have used yourself up for them,” was just one of the points that resonated with the crowd. |
 Immersed in conversation about when we felt powerful |
Here’s what Rita Arens has to say about the event over on BlogHer:
I tend to lack a governor. I would write myself into an early grave if it weren’t for my family.
Balance, which I’ve written about before, is tough whether or not you live with other people. I don’t think for one minute that single people don’t have balance issues — in fact, if I were living alone, I would actually have more balance issues than I do now, because I would have to depend on myself to tear me away from the blinking screen . . . I am trying lately to avoid using myself up.
Rita came up to me after the panel and told me that she wished she had had someone like me to talk to when she was 15. I told her that I wish I had had Gloria Feldt to talk to when I was 15!
Here’s what Talyn Helman has to say in her Young Feminist’s Point of View.
Read MoreFathers Day Edition: Daughters Make the Political Personal for Dads
Obama’s “Promoting Strong Fathers” speech and town hall last week was not just great role modeling and a politically smart thing to do, it had some very poignant moments that scratched the surface, albeit gently, of the president’s quest to know his father. He came to terms with that missing piece of his own identity long ago, as chronicled in his book, Dreams of My Father.
Still, I couldn’t help but feel sadness in my heart when he talked about his absent father, even as he expressed appreciation for his mother’s struggles and how his loving grandparents cared for him.
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I was watching the town hall because fathers were much on my mind as I prepared for yesterday’s “Dads, Dudes and Doing It” panel, along with WomenGirlsLadies co-panelists, Courtney Martin, Kristal Brent Zook, and Deborah Siegel-Acevedo. Together, we span five decades in age and we speak through both gender and generational lens.
[caption id="attachment_3666" align="alignleft" width="269" caption="My friends called my father "Big Max" because it described both his height--6' 3"--and his personality"]
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We had a lot of fun as we always do with our panels, but it was nevertheless emotional for each of us in different ways to be talking about our fathers. I’m the panel’s senior citizen, and I was missing my daddy who died almost 15 years ago. I speculated that he never connected his personal declaration that his daughters could do “anything their pretty little heads desire” with the political movement of women that a decade or two later would turn the political system upside down to make sure we actually could aspire without legal impediment to whatever heights we wanted.
Read MoreWILL THE GENERATIONS OF WOMEN COME TOGETHER IN PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION?
Continuing the intergenerational conversation among women I jumped into on this blog below in “What’s That About a Sisterhood Split?“, two young writers who have already distinguished themselves as influential feminist thinkers, Courtney Martin and Deborah Siegel, have penned an op ed published in the Washington Post today. It’s entitled “Come Together? Yes We Can”, and definitely worth a read. Not just your “can’t we all get along?” plea, but rather a look at the generational divide revealed by the Democratic primary competition. An excerpt:
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