http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KM3XNhEmdE

Malala Yousafzai is incredible. There are lessons for all nations in this clip, as universal access to education has not been achieved anywhere in the world.

Keeping in mind:

“The Western savior complex has hijacked Malala’s message. The West has killed more girls than the Taliban have. The West has denied more girls an education via their missiles than the Taliban has by their bullets. The West has done more against education around the world than extremists could ever dream of. So, please, spare us the self-righteous and self-congratulatory message that is nothing more than propaganda that tells us that the West drops bombs to save girls like Malala.” – Assed Baig

The truth is if I do find someone while I am out tonight, I want them to know that I am not good at being a girl, that there are other things about me beyond my precarious femininity that I value more, and that if things work out, I will expect them to value.

I guess I expect whoever it is to be in on the joke that is my femininity, but why is it a joke? It’s a joke because I’m fat, and fat girls are funny, right? It’s funny when we wear frilly skirts and bikinis, it’s funny when we act flirtatious and sexy, it’s funny when we dance with our jiggling bums and bellies. My fat body is funny because that’s what the media tells me about it, I am not the protagonist, I am their best friend who Can’t Get Laid. If a thin person and I wear the same outfit to a party, they’re two different outfits, conveying two very different stories.

…

I realize today that my relationship to gender has been impacted by the ways that others understand and interpret fat bodies. Bodies that by their very nature are incapable of fitting into traditional modes of gender conformity. I always felt afraid of embracing the more masculine parts of myself for fear of losing my already precarious grip on femininity. It was a relationship to my gender created by fear and social policing, built on a logic that “if you are not one thing than you are another.” To be feminine is to be small and delicate to a fault, so if you are already thick, you are fighting an uphill battle to meet norms that are already elusive.

Read more here.

The Femme Project

The invisibility amongst this community seems to stem from this femininity, as femmes identify as queer but maintain an image that some, from both within the queer community and from outside, may mistake as heterosexual, challenging stereotypes of identity and sexuality.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-sZW2_pEK4

Today, T. and I explored the Museum of Civilization in Gatineau to check out the exhibit on Haitian vodou.

The exhibit consisted of a collection from a Swiss woman who became a Haitian citizen and collected the pieces out of respect and admiration for Vodou practices. While I questioned the implications of this ownership, the exhibit itself was written and presented extremely tastefully, with brutal honesty in regards to the behaviour and impact of colonizers.

One of my favourite quotes, describing one of the sculptures from the exhibit, states:

This sculpture depicts a man behind a person who has been transformed into a zombie. According to popular belief, to turn people into zombies, one of their souls must be captured. Zombies are aware of what is happening to them but have no will of their own, so they cannot react. Their masters can therefore do whatever they want with them. Zombification is the supreme punishment because it reduces people to the condition that Vodou was used to counter: slavery. 

We also had a great picnic lunch outside – check out our view of the Parliament buildings and Chateau Laurier!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tujOgnbnfc4