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Tag Archives: International Women’s Day

Happy International Women’s Day!

08 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by laviniacollins in feminism, Uncategorized

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

beyonce, femfog, feminism, International Women's Day

Happy International Women’s Day!

6c56dc376c928fad2f2487ababba9489.jpg
(To pre-empt any of those kinds of comments, FYI International Men’s Day is November 19th)

Today, perhaps unsurprisingly, I want to talk about “internet feminism”.

Women of the internet know well how easy it is to make a particular group of online men angry. I’ve written a couple of post that have made that particular community (*cough* red pill thread *cough*) rather angry.

First, I was one of the many online voices criticising Scott Aaronson for saying that life was better when women were simply handed to men when they came of age. I actually had a rather productive discussion with him, after he commented on the post. Though we didn’t come to see eye-to-eye, I gained something from it. This didn’t stop his posse of followers (which, to his credit, he disavowed on twitter) from bombarding my comments with everything from poorly punctuated claims that I was an idiot to actual threats. C’est la vie pour la femme en-ligne, as the French would (probably) say.

Then, I was upset when Tim Hunt said women were too emotional for science. This was a relatively low-key event only, very excitingly, Louise Mensch tried to troll me on twitter. Disappointingly for both of us, I think, when I ignored her she lost interest. No fifteen minutes of Louise Menschy fame for me!

But the piece de resistance came in January last year when venerable medievalist Allen Frantzen’s adorably 80s blog became a matter of public awareness. It became a matter of public awareness because it was a misogynistic, hate-filled diatribe against women. I spoke out. My response got posted in some other media outlets. Then I ended up on some Reddit hit-list. Granted, I was only about public enemy number 7, but I was still bombarded with the kind of comments and emails you think are a parody of what red pill dudebros write. My favourite one told me I would be sorry when the men left “the village” to live in the wild. I may well be! Is Jon Hamm one of these men? Don’t go, Jon. I didn’t mean it. Women are silly and like handbags. Please come back to my village.

Anyway, it’s been an educational time being a woman with opinions and a blog. What I find interesting about the whole “internet feminist” bag is how offended many of these particular individuals are about my expressing my opinion on my blog and my twitter. I don’t much care for their opinions, but I don’t go to their blogs and tell them that I’m going to leave the village (?? because why, actually, would I do that?) and I certainly don’t bombard them with threats. I don’t know why women speaking about this online on their own blogs and twitter feeds is seen as so antagonistic and threatening. I don’t agree with what Breitbart of Return of Kings (oh god don’t google it, they’re awful) say, but I don’t feel the need to shout them down.

So here I am not being shouted down. Here’s to many more days of making those who don’t like women talking (on their own damn blogs!) angry. And to every brave, writing woman on the internet. So many of you are so much braver than me.

 

Lavinia xxx

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International Women’s Day, “Women Writers” and the Woman Corner

08 Saturday Mar 2014

Posted by laviniacollins in Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

feminism, International Women's Day, writers

feminism women writers

Today, since it is International Women’s Day, and the theme is ‘Inspire Change’, I thought I would take the opportunity to talk about one small change that could be made, that make a huge difference to me, and “women writers” like me.

And this is part of the problem. I am sure I am not the only one who dislikes having to refer to herself as a “woman writer”, or who bristles any time anyone uses that awful, insulting derivative “authoress”. The “Woman Corner” where all of the women who write novels, or poetry, or plays, are put is still a big problem. It’s the reason that (in the distant days of being student) I managed to spend three years studying literature and only read two female writers: Elizabeth Barrett Browning (commonly also referred to only by her married name as Elizabeth Browning) and Margarey Kempe (who possibly did not even exist). What’s more, reading their work came under a “women’s writing” themed week.

We have one day a year. We have one week a term that is the “women” week.

But women are not a special event. We’re half the world (slightly more than half). Still, the view of the writing of female authors is still so backward that last week I walked into Waterstones to find that there was a “women writers” stand where Harper Lee was placed right next to Phillippa Gregory. I like Harper Lee. I like Philippa Gregory. But apart from being successful authors in their wildly different fields, all they have in common is their chromosomal makeup. I should let it slide, you say? I wonder if people would let it slide if Waterstones had a ‘black authors’ stand.

Apart from the fact that it’s downright unhelpful to lump all female authors together on one stand, it’s offensive, and it’s symptomatic of the wider problem that men are seen as the default, and women as the special event. It was a long time ago that Samuel Johnson said ” a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all”, and while the attitude to female authors has at least progressed a long way from this, we are still in a “woman corner”, identified by our gender rather than what we write.

So, some fiction is “gender neutral”, some is aimed at women, and some at men. That’s an important part of marketing. Why, then, don’t we have a “men’s fiction” section in waterstones, that features novels with cars on the cover, or the word ‘spy’ in the title? Just as many romance novels are also read by men, these novels are also read by women, but marketed to men.

There’s nothing wrong with saying that specific books are marketed to specific genders. Certainly, my own work is (appropriately) marketed to a female audience, part of the reason why I used my first name rather than initials, which would have been marketing suicide if I were publishing in a different genre. Gender-weighted marketing makes sense. What doesn’t is the idea that there is “women’s fiction” and then everything else. “Women writers” and normal writers. Authors, and  authoresses.

So, maybe this seems trivial to you, but the change I am suggesting this year for International Women’s Day that we make a small change to our bookshelves, that will hopefully reflect a big change in thought. Please, no more “woman corner” where female authors of all genres get inelegantly lumped together. Please, no more “women’s fiction” unless we are going to have “men’s fiction” as well.

Women represent 58% of book purchasing. Don’t put us in the corner anymore.

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