If you are friends with me on Facebook, you will know that my header is a photo of Winona Ryder’s character, Veronica, from Heathers. Veronica was my anti-hero in high school. She stood up to the mean girl, the meanest of them all, Heather “Fuck me gently with a chainsaw” Chandler, by accidentally icing [...]
April 18, 2013
As the Boston Marathon week of questions and grief winds down, the face of the youngest bomber is everywhere. His classmates have been interviewed. They are surprised, taken aback and alarmed that their quiet classmate had slowly been transformed into a foot soldier. Youthful zealotry, unchecked, [...]
April 12, 2013
When will it stop? This week two teenage girls–TWO–killed themselves as a result of not just their brutal gang rapes, but because their brutal gang rapes were passed along on the internet like horrible entertainment. Feed the girl to the lions. This is not the Coliseum, folks. We no longer feed victims to the Lion, [...]
April 1, 2013
If you haven’t seen the mini-documentary “Dirty Girls” about a group of teenagers from the 90s who are bullied for being different, for “not taking showers,” shopping at thrift stores and writing riot grrrl ‘zines about sexual abuse and how women should be treated–you’re going to be truly surprised by their peers’ critical reaction. (“They’re [...]
March 18, 2013
When I was growing up, I sat at our dining room table and wrote big books with crayon pictures. I wrote stories about girls and cats and snow picnics. I had a thing for the snow picnic, the idea of a basket under a tree, blanket spread out on the snow captured my imagination for [...]
January 31, 2013
A list of things I thought I’d never say, back when my kids were little cutie-pies: You can’t go out in that, it’s my job to keep you from getting abducted Stacking your dishes with sauce and pasta glued on them, is not cleaning up after yourselves You texted me when you meant to [...]
January 22, 2013
My thick, kinky hair has never been something easy to manage. I’ve tried hundreds of products. As a teen, I’d stare dreamily at girls with straight hair, desperate to feather my hair just once. I’d cry with envy when Marcia Brady brushed her hair 100 times with abandon. Curly girls don’t brush their hair. Ever. [...]
January 7, 2013
In following and writing about the Steubenville rape case, there’s become quite a call for some serious revenge. There’s all sorts of calls to action like: “I hope those guys get what’s coming to them.” And, “Karma’s a bitch.” WTOV9, a local station, reports that one of the Steubenville Big Red football players admitted they’re [...]
January 3, 2013
I saw Django Unchained over the weekend, and the similarities in vigilantism between that movie and what’s currently happening with the Steubenville, Ohio rape case are hard to ignore. Of course, the victim in this case–a 16-year-old who was raped repeatedly over the period of one night in Steubenville, Ohio–wasn’t the vigilante-in-charge as Django became. [...]
December 19, 2012
Here’s what happened in Steubenville, Ohio on August 11 after a neighborhood party. An unconscious girl, a teenager, drunk out of her mind and completely blacked out, was raped repeatedly. Pictures were taken, then passed around, just as she was recklessly passed around that night. According to the New York Times, some folks in Steubenville [...]
"A thoughtful, provocative look at the not-so-pretty and the sometimes-out-there sides of parenthood."--Kristen Kemp, Baristakids.com
April 23, 2013
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