I like you so much better when you're naked

active-rva:

Every Saturday, from 9-11am, in front of the Richmond Medical Center for Women (118 North Boulevard, Richmond, VA), volunteers are needed to escort patients past anti-abortion protestors.

See more information through the title link to the Richmond Clinic Defense Facebook group. New escorts are welcome any Saturday, and you can also contact rvaclinicdefense@gmail.com. NO SIGNS; the escort is not a protest.

(via andyouhavetogivethemhope)

In some parts of rural Maine, there were dozens, dozens of black people who came in and voted on Election Day. Everybody has a right to vote, but nobody in town knows anyone who’s black. How did that happen?

—

Maine Republican chair suspects voter fraud because black people voted in his state.

He actually said this, and then some. Watch the whole thing.

(via think-progress)

(via pantslessprogressive)

The reality is that so-called pro-life movement is not about saving babies. It’s about punishing women for having sex. That’s why they oppose birth control. That’s why they want to ban abortion even though doing so will simply drive women to have dangerous back alley abortions. That’s why they want to penalize women who take public assistance and then dare to have sex, leaving an exemption for those who become pregnant from rape. It’s not about babies. If it were about babies, they would be making access to birth control widespread and free and creating a comprehensive social safety net so that no woman finds herself with a pregnancy she can’t afford. They would be raising money for research on why half of all zygotes fail to implant and working to prevent miscarriages. It’s not about babies. It’s about controlling women. It’s about making sure they have consequences for having unapproved sex.

—How I Lost Faith in the “Pro-Life” Movement

(via thenewwomensmovement)

Emotional neglect lays the groundwork for the emotional numbing that helps boys feel better about being cut off. Eruptions of rage in boys are most often deemed normal, explained by the age-old justification of adolescent patriarchal misbehavior, “boys will be boys”. Patriarchy both creates the rage in boys and then contains it for later use, making it a resource to exploit later on as boys become men. As a national product, this rage can be garnered to further imperialism, hatred and oppression of women and men globally. This rage is needed if boys are to become men wiling to travel around the world to fight wars without ever demanding that other ways of solving conflict can be found.

—bell hooks 

(Source: maarnayeri, via wilde-is-on-mine)

Because agency to enjoy one’s own body isn’t a crime. Because sex has been used as a weapon against marginalized bodies for the past few millenniums. Because hypersexuality isn’t a compliment, nor is it liberating. It’s a racialized, oppressive marking on black and brown bodies that’s been used to degrade us for centuries and I think it’s time we took our bodies back. Because women are punished and scrutinized no matter what. No sex, all sex, queer sex, sex with one’s self, it’s all bad, because the bigger message is we as women do not own ourselves. Because men in my home country still think they have the right to carve out pieces of my flesh and that my reproductive system only exists to procreate children who aren’t even culturally allowed to bear my name. Because little girls in Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia are considered sexual deviants from birth and it’s time to throw out that outdated bullshit. Because this is my fucking body and I can do what I want. Because slutwalk was a fucking joke in every conceivable way and it’s clear that the face of sex positivity shouldn’t be the women who’ve had the most sexual agency. Because hijabis aren’t the antithesis to sexual liberation. Because I am a Somali immigrant and there needs to be more variation of who we are than just Iman and Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Because I exist as a hypersexualized, desexualized, oppressed, stereotyped individual and I’m quite fucking sick of it. Because I want my body and the autonomy to form my own image back.

—My friend Khadijah on why she’s sex positive and what it means to her

(Source: maarnayeri, via fuckyeahwomenprotesting2)

Because femininity is so focused on women’s bodies, the value placed on various attributes of female bodies means that evaluations of femininity are fairly clearcut. Within standards of feminine beauty that correlate closely with race and age women are pretty or they are not. Historically, in the American context, young women with milky White skin, long blond hair, and slim figures were deemed to be the most beautiful and therefore the most feminine women. Within this interpretive context, skin color, body type, hair texture, and facial features become important dimensions of femininity. This reliance on these standards of beauty automatically render the majority of African American women at best as less beautiful, and at worst, ugly. Moreover, these standards of female beauty have no meaning without the visible presence of Black women and others who fail to measure up. Under these feminine norms, African American women can never be as beautiful as White women because they never become White.

—Patricia Hill Collins 

(Source: wretchedoftheearth, via safercampus)