Sarah Clements, the daughter of a Sandy Hook survivor, wrote an open letter to Amy Schumer saying, “as a woman, a daughter and sister, a national figure, and a role model, you have a real stake in gun violence happening all around you.” Clements went on, “the experience of women in a country overshadowed by rampant, targeted gun violence and fear and hatred of women by people who are armed. This is not freedom — at least not for women.”
A writer at Paste Magazine responded to this call for Schumer to take arms by saying, “I can think of one reason why this unrealistic expectation of Schumer is so difficult for me to resist: She and I are both women and we all (other women included) expect women to be self-sacrificing for the sake of the social good.” What do you think, Weird Sister readers?
In other news, there’s a Spitboy memoir coming out! Read an interview with Michelle Cruz Gonzales of the legendary Chicana female punk band, Spitboy here.
Samhita Mukhopadhyay writes that “focusing on an institution that has long been reliant on patriarchy denies us the freedom to be our truest selves” in “Modern Love Needs a New Romantic Paradigm.”
Gabby Bess writes about the young Black women ignored by Riot Grrrl history.
Out of 35 of the “most anticipated” summer Blockbusters, only 2 of them have been directed by women. Yawn.
Check out five writers discussing cultural appropriation and feminism.
Feminist linguist Deborah Cameron “argues that policing the way women talk is a harmfully limiting tactic akin to policing the way women look.”
Jos Truitt of Feministing says that the “Trailer for the Whitewashed Stonewall Movie Looks Even Worse” than expected. I’d have to agree.
“The threat of adult men violating women and boys haunts every era and subculture, because art worlds like these exist within a larger culture that’s fundamentally patriarchal and racist, placing white men in positions of ultimate authority, and men above women, even when people work to cultivate equality.”
Check out Ann Friedman’s pie chart about why people are so eager to defund Planned Parenthood. Then read about how defunding Planned Parenthood “isn’t about abortion at all. It’s about cutting women off from necessary and life-saving health care.”
This image reminds us why a magazine like #SheShreds is so important.
Producer, writer and director Issa Ray asks, “How hard is it to portray a three-dimensional woman of color on television or in film? I’m surrounded by them.”
“To her admirers, she was an advocate for inclusion and a pioneering woman in a male-dominated field. To her detractors, she was shill for the ‘social justice warriors’ who wanted to censor the site…” – From “How Ellen Pao, who oversaw the effort to rid Reddit of harassment, became its latest victim”
If you live in L.A., you have one more day to check out “Let Power Take a Female Form” at The Box Gallery. “This exhibition looks at a matriarchal lineage of three women in the same family. Grandmother, mother, and granddaughter, each deeply embedded in the Los Angeles art scene from its formative stage to present day, navigate matrices of power, inclusion, exclusion and access. With each generation, a narrative and through-line emerges of common traumas, common bonds, paradigms of womanhood, and how each disrupted those constructs through art.”
Read a new poem by Eileen Myles here.
What did we miss this week? Let us know in the comments! <3
