Political Red Shift

In case you missed it I am incredibly excited about Jeremy Corbyn's Labor Leadership bid and that at the very least we have someone publicly and repeatedly getting the airtime to refute the austerity myth. I am not the only one there is a growing movement of people who are beginning to glimmer some hope and I think Jeremy Corbyn will do better than many people originally predicted.

The media reporting and general public perception of the anti-austerity movement is much more dismissive and mocking than history will be. The reality is that the idea's that Jeremy and the wider movement he listens to and dialogs with, are not extreme or overly ideological. Mostly they are not knew ideas mostly they are things that our society at some point has accepted as sensible. 

So why do so many people perceive this movement as so much 'lefter' or 'redder' than it actually is? I think the stars can help us answer this.

Red Shift is the name for the phenomenon that describes why some stars look red. When we look at stars that are moving away from us (or we are moving away from them) the light coming from them, which we know should be a yellow color, looks red. This is because the wavelength appears to look longer because the objects are moving away from each other. It's the same reason that when a police car goes past you the siren sounds with a lower pitch as it drives away from you. 

I think we have a similar situation in european politics. The right are moving to the right and arguably with increasing velocity. We find ourselves on this moving object and as we look out at alternative galaxies we our not conscious of our own position or relative direction through the political universe. As we look out at alternative galaxies many of them, that in reality have been more constant than we ever have, appear to be getting increasingly red. 

Political Doppler effect or Political Red Shift (n.): the means by which the political left appears far left because of the speed with which the right is moving far right. 

The Center for Victim Blamming

I generally try to avoid any contact with the Center for Social Justice because the shear force of its victim blaming, patronising and fact denying seems to overwhelming to counter. I'm often left totally unsure where to start and feel it needs someone with a greater insight to write about it.

However this is my blog and one of its main functions is for me to spit and his about things that annoy me without forcing anyone to listen. So here is me setting out some of my main concerns with the CSJ.

1. The Appropriation of the term Social Justice

Social Justice means something. As a blog form the CSJ points out the concept of Social Justice 'has long been owned by those on the left' and adds 'of British politics'. Social Justice is a concept that is both ancient and global it doesn't belong to Britain but has in the main belonged to progressives. Now that doesn't mean people on the right have nothing to contribute but what is most helpful in debate is for people to critique views they don't agree with and present alternative arguments. What the CSJ has done is simply come up with their own understanding of social justice and then act as though it is the dominant understanding.

2. Lack of clarity and transparency

The CSJ describes itself as independent, the BBC often describes it as right leaning which is far more accurate though I think still not the whole picture. I don't understand why it doesn't formalise and declare its exact link to the conservative party. The Fabian society for example clearly describes itself as being affiliated to the Labour Party. Why couldn't the CSJ do an equivalent? 

The second transparency issue is the lack of definition of Social Justice as a concept. Given that they are clearly using an understanding different from the most commonly held agreed understandings it would be very useful if they could define what they mean.

3. Policy Suggestions or Research 

I asked this question specifically in regards to the Girls and Gangs report. I was told it was research and given an answer about methodology but that answer only really addressed data collection not how it was coded or analysed. You can ask front line workers, but how you collate and interpret what they say can impact massively on the final message.

4. Origins of Poverty

Though its never directly stated my impression of the overarching narrative of CSJ is that the cause of poverty is decision and behaviors made by poor people themselves. Though they acknowledge the cyclical nature of things they consistently refer to social breakdown as causing poverty while most Social Justice activists would see poverty and inequality as the cause for social breakdown. Infact I find much of their narrative victim blaming. They state that:

'Social justice is not achieved by focussing on the poverty line or tweaking the benefits budget.  Instead, it requires unleashing the work of change in people’s lives to create in them opportunities and hopes for the future, as well as a level playing field for positive choices.'

In this framework we must work to persaude or punitively pursue people to change themselves because they are the origin of the problem. They are responsible not only for their own poverty and inequality but also for the fact that they don't experience life as a level playing-field. If only they were better and more um I don't know 'like us'. 

The reality is that we live in a desperately unequal society where wealth, resources, voice and power are more and more exclusively in the hands of the minority. The cause of poverty quiet frankly is wealth. 

None of this would concern me so much if a.) they where more upfront about their underlying assumptions and b.) I didn't have the sneaky suspicion they where hugely influential. I've decided I am going to watch the CSJ more closely. 
Here are some other articles I found that are much more eloquent: 


http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/jun/11/tory-vilification-poor-child-poverty

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/08/duncan-smith-poverty-benefit-sanctions-easterhouse

http://www.newleftproject.org/index.php/site/article_comments/manufacturing_ignorance_the_centre_for_social_justice_and_welfare_reform_in

Ask the Left questions

'Just because someone was born and raised in Islington does it give them the right to have housing in Islington?'

This question through me slightly it was one of those situations where I felt unease in my gut but have taken a number of weeks to ponder it and unearth the exact reason for my unease.

Islington's house prices are staggering and rents rocket along with them. Overcrowding, poor quality accommodation, isolation and families being moved out of the borough are common problems. There are 1.3 jobs for every resident in Islington yet as a borough we have higher than national average unemployment. It is a borough of huge inequalities.

And the question being asked by someone on the left is loaded in a way that requires the poor to justify themselves. And there is reason for that. It was one incident that got me thinking but it was reflective of a theme. The dominant questions being asked are in the main being asked by the right. But should we be asking them or attempting to answer them at all? When I look at the housing problems in Islington I see a whole load of questions that have been left out of the asking. 

Lets stop answering the rights questions with long convoluted arguments that are straining to move the discussion leftwards at glacial pace -lets just ask the left out questions. Like should a small group of people with no long term commitment to an area be aloud to extract profit from its housing market, contribute nothing to the local community and move out leaving a greater number of its local residents in poverty? 

Perhaps many of us who like to consider ourselves leftist activists cant confront theses things and ask those questions until we have come to turns with our own hypocrisy. I live in an ex-local that I own. 

Perhaps neo-liberalism and capitalism has won out so much that only the fringes and outliers will ever be brave enough to ask questions about private ownership but I hope not. I hope questions about who has the right to own resources and space will become mainstream. Asking the questions doesn't mean we have to offer the answers of the past but it does acknowledge they where good questions to ask.

A New Year

Inspired by Hannah Mudge's blog here are some reflections and some looking forward to 2014.

2013 was an odd year. I was mostly pregnant which drained me of energy. Life was pretty stressful for a number of reasons and mostly I was glad to see the back of it. It did have some redeeming features, a new baby and some fabulous lodgers. Like Hannah I also found little time to write and when I did found myself getting into probably pointless discussions about gender differences.

2014 feels like a very new year and I am getting increasingly energetic about it. There is so much to be done. 

Today I began to read the news again - depressing. 

First thing I read yet another suggestion we are in danger of heading to a police state. 

Then for one reason or another I ended up on the Center For Social Justice Website which caused me to become so irritated I overcame years of deliberating and waiting for them to swing to the left and joined the labor party.

So first blog of the year, hear are my thoughts on the Center for Social Justice. I am too depressed to deal with 'ipnas'.

Center for Social Justice - sounds like the sort of thing I should love. I do not I find it incredibly problematic. 

My first problem is its name. Social Justice means something in common understanding. the Center has taken the phrase and appropriated it for their own purpose. Social Justice in most people's understanding, would involve changing the social structures in which people are oppressed. 

CSJ narrative seems to be that social breakdown causes poverty. Reading between the lines would suggest they think people chose to be poor. Most social justice activists and organisations would probably argue that poverty caused by economic inequality causes much 'social breakdown'.

I could get over all this if the they described  themselves as a right of center think tank on social issues. But they don't they describe themselves as 'independent'. They have pictures of Cameron all over their website and most crucially they were set up by Ian Duncan Smith. Are they really trying to convince me they are free to critique government policy? All this explains the 'social breakdown' rhetoric though.

Bllur!!!

Then I read that Cameron's barber got given an MBE. 

I imagine I will be blogging quiet a lot of grump this year and hopefully seeing some collectivist action against ridiculousness.  

I was given a red beret for Christmas. Wearing it definitely makes me feel revolutionary. To the non-violent resistant barricade and lets all get an ipnas. 

Taxes

There have been many terrible terrible thing's that have been said of late about social security and those in receipt of it. And there are many people doing a valiant attempt to refute them in the rhetorical war exploding around us. However there is a phrase that I keep hearing that is not being challenged which is 'Taxpayers money'.

Is it just me or does this phrase not make sense. If I pay taxes then the money that I pay to the treasury is by definition no longer mine but belongs to the nation. Now I have a democratic duty to hold the government to account for how they administer our collective resources, but it is not my money it belongs to all of us as a collective.

The problem with referring to it as taxpayers money implies that as a taxpayer I somehow have greater right to decided how it is spent than those who currently are not paying tax, and by inference the more tax you pay the more decision making power you have. There is something inherently undemocratic in that. 

I am also fed up of being told what upsets me as a tax payer. There are things about social security that upset me, but not the ones the government tell me are upsetting me. It upsets me that there is such a thing as working tax credits and that people can work a 30 -40 hour week and still not earn enough to survive. I fundamentally think the purpose of social security should not be to subsidies the private sector; they should jolly well pay decent wages. 

It upsets me the amount of housing benefit people need to claim. Which is the result, not of too many children or people scrounging of the state, or living in Kensington. It is the result of unscrupulous capitalists, decades of daft housing policy and an obsession with private ownership. It upsets me that the tax system isn't such that it curbs the behavior of such empire builders.

But what upsets me more than any of this is that while friends and love ones are being squeezed to live on what is not possible to live on, while the price of everything is going up and life is getting tougher for almost everyone I know. I take a walk round central London and see wealth oozing out of the city. When I pass 6 Starbucks on a street and get sent links via amazon. When I see an add for a bank that the country bailed out with amounts of money I can't even conceive of, offering me an app to help me budget better. Then I get really really mad. That is what Tax payers are upset about (well this one at least).

Two Books on Women

 

I recently read 'How to be a Woman' by Caitlin Moran followed fairly immediately by 'A year of Biblical Womanhood' by Rachel Held Evans. I'm glad I read them this way round! It struck me that there were some interesting differences and notable contrasts that I wanted to share with the world.

I think I might start backwards. Both authors conclude that there is not and shouldn't be a prescribed way to be a woman. For Evans book this felt like the natural conclusion to her discussion. I felt the narrative learnt from the experience of other women from a diversity of cultural experiences and approached such learning with a humble heart. Yet it stayed authentically itself and gave me as the reader permission to do so as well.

Moran's book however irritated me most of the way through. It was essentially an autobiography but despite it's beginning and conclusion about the diversity of female experience I couldn't help but feel I was being told that this was or should have been my experience as well. Especially the stuff around adolescents. 

Both books reference other women who have fought similar battles before and have begun to forge a way and in who's path we follow as well as contemporaries. Evan's does so with great respect and gratitude to those 'Women of Valour' both past and present. One of her final resolutions is to identify and praise women of valor. 

Moran by contrasts dismisses most of her contemporaries, including Object and even Greer as having become irrelevant.  The only woman who comes of relatively well is Lady Gaga.  While Evans writing humbly acknowledge's the work of those who have gone before. Moran writes 'When Simone de Beauvoir wrote one is note born a woman one becomes a woman - she didn't know the half of it.' Hmm.

Moran repeatedly says that woman have done very little (even nothing) over the last 100,000 years, while men she claims have made great achievements in science, art politics and repeatedly in her long lists she includes empire. I find it very problematic to list empire in with a list of great advancements without any deconstruction or critique of the very idea of empire. Evan's by contrast retells the stories of many great women's achievement both biblical and extra biblical. She also on occasion broadens her critique not just to hierarchy between genders but the idea of hierarchy at all in any context.

Both repeatedly use the word 'Lady'. I have written about my dislike of the word here. Evans however only ever used it in contexts where, had she been talking about men she may well have said gentlemen. Generally when she was talking about people and only once directed to the readers. Moran however got right up my noise by continually giving instructions to her readers preceded by calling them to attention with 'Ladies!'. 

Both authors while not writing a book about violence against women and the global situation do reference it. Evans to put her own struggles and difficulties in perspective. Moran to explain that the problem with modern feminism is that it is focused on these things while ignoring things like glossy magazines and pants being too small.

Both authors once mention the Vietnam war, both use it for illustrative purposes. In the case of both books I have forgotten what was being described! Evan's I remember said that some group of people discussed something - "Like veterans talk about 'Nam" I can't remember feeling it was inappropriate or offensive. I cannot remember the details of what Moran was talking about either save that it was about running away "faster than a Vietnamese boy covered in Nepalm". I wasn't expecting that sentence it kind of sprang at me from no where and made me feel positively sick.

Both authors discussed having children. Evan's wrote an honest and reflective account of her worries and fears about having children. She also explored issues around women's relationship with parenting and the difficulty of living in a world which defines women in relation to children and explored the duff theology in parenting as a woman's highest calling. Moran on the other hand wrote 'Childbirth gives women a gigantic set of balls'. To be fair on Moran this is not all she said and she did also point out that there are a variety of life experiences that can change and shape us. But it's almost that that makes these bizar one lines so problematic there is an inconsistency in her writing.

Both authors mention their vagina's. Evans in a discussion about teenage experience of church teaching on sex.  Famously there was big discussions about how that would affect christian bookshops and whether they were willing to stock the book or not. As far as I am aware there where no such discussions as to the inclusion of the c word which I can't even bring myself to write, but that's apparently what Moran calls her vagina.

Both books made me laugh out loud. Moran's book also made me shout and swear. Evan's book also made me cry. Moran's book left me with an overwhelming sense of frustration. Evan's book left me peaceful and wiser. 

My tuppence on intersectionality

Don't bother reading this blog read this and definitely this oh and this oh and this is about why Christianity needs to be intersectional.

I just have two things to say about intersectionality, which I can't spell and to a certain degree don't understand.

1.) I am so grateful for the concept of intersectionality because as a privately educated, white, middle class oxbridge educated woman, who has never experienced violence at the hands of a man I have to honestly say that a lot of times the sort oppression I read about in feminist literature I have no experience of. I am still passionate about feminism. Intersectionality gives me the ability to say - yes I experience oppression as a woman - but I also experience huge levels of privilege, unfair privilege. I don't want to spread my privalege I want to understand how to give it up. How do I change the way I live so that the accident of my birth is no longer oppressive to others. I cannot look to people like me to give me answers.

I'm currently reading 'In Search of Our Mothers Gardens' by Alice Walker. I picked it up at a second hand bookshop cause it looked interesting not because I felt the need to read it (my privilege). What I didn't expect was to find it so emotional a read or so revolutionary. I expected it to be well written and interesting. I didn't expect it to explain to me what it means to be white. The truth is I don't think a white woman could write a book about what it means to be white. Privilege is blind (or often chooses to be). We must not reject criticism of those with less privilege we desperately need to seek it out if we our to find true humanity.

2.) It is nonsense to say that only 'academic' people can understand intersectionality. We all come acros new words all the time. First time I read it I hadn't heard it so I looked it up witch does not take an MA in gender studies. 

I ran a participative workshop recently with some of the most marginalised women in the country. I wanted to explore intersectionality with them as I wanted their perspective - they got it 100% and taught me loads and loads. The workshop wasn't really about explaining intersectionality of oppressions - they understood that in a way no MA or doctorate could ever teach. What it did do was give the problem a name and last time I checked that was a big part of what feminism was about - naming things. 

We mustn't shy away from new words, we should be the ones creating them. 

"Conservative christians" aren't the only ones with something to say...

I am unapologetically christian (and if you're into labels evangelical at that) and I am unapologetically feminist and socialist. This is not easy at the same time as being remarkably easy. I always say I am a feminist and a socialist not despite being a christian but because I am a christian - but that's a blog for another time.

Here I just want to try and explain why groups and spaces that only ever (or in the overwhelming majority of cases) refer to faith communities in terms of the 'religious right', are doing themselves and their causes no favours. I am in no way suggesting they stop exposing stupid things said by such groups but that they equally ensure they give the same platform  to faith communities with different perspectives. Here are the dangers I perceive with the current set-up:

1.) Firstly it gives an inaccurate portrayal of Britain's faith communities thereby spreading mis-understanding and miss trust and weakening community cohesion. What you say may be an accurate representation of a certain subset which is already very vocal - so why give them the microphone again? I know many many churches where it would be a brave person who admits that they vote Tory. Many christians are pretty left of centre. I can't speak for other faith communities but I'm sure the same is true - they are not all right of centre, but those voices that are not, are almost completely absent from those environments where I hear the 'religious right' condemned with huge regularity.

2.) Secondly it makes a group of people rather than an ideology the route problem. We need to confront and challenge the belief system if we are ever to change the world. And almost without fail when the 'religious right' or 'conservative christians' and blamed for a belief system I can think of several people with no faith who hold the same views.

3.) There is often a bad use of logic. I have very often heard people disregard an argument because its 'what christians believe'. Just because someone you don't like thinks one thing doesn't mean the opposite is automatically true!

4.) It plays straight into the hands of the 'this is a christian country' rhetoric. All those people out there who do not hold a genuine believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and that he came that we may be reconciled to God, to each other and to the earth, but who self define as christian for political motives are able to continue to wield political power. This is especially dangerous in our current climate. Because if you only present faith groups as right wing, you continue to feed that false perception, that this is a large group who have the hotline to God and face no criticism from within their community making them seem like a much larger group than they actually are and allowing those who do not genuinely have an active faith to align themselves with them.

5.) You alienate people like me, people who would like to be your allies. And I am very definitely not alone.

6.) You convince people the only option is to be religious + right or secular and left driving some away from faith and many away from the left. I know many christians who read right wing papers because they don't feel welcome elsewhere - if they did their politics might be very different.

We really need to change the understanding of faith and political views. I can't talk for other faith communities but certainly among the faith communities I'm part of 'conservative' christians are by far in the minority.  Most of us are desperately trying to see the world change in progressive ways, trying to be Christ-like, trying to see a just, equitable, sustainable world.

So next time you write or say something about 'conservative christians' or the 'religious right' could you just put in a sentence or two about what 'progressive christians' or the 'religious left' think. I would be very grateful.  Thanks.

Privilege blindness is a choice

It is not uncommon for me to get very upset about a policy announcement, action or inaction from the current government. In fact I am starting to feel quiet depressed at the current situation to the point of spending large amounts of my day shouting or wanting to cry.

But today something happened that was so revolting it made even my mild mannered, peaceful husband shout 'what?'  and declare that he was very upset. I am referring of course to the announcement that housing benefit might be withdrawn from those under 25.

I'll be honest I've not read beyond the headlines, I can't bring myself too, I may end up in a quivering wreck on the floor. What upsets me most is that the political classes cannot pretend not to understand what they are doing.

I had an incredibly privileged upbringing, I've done the boarding school thing, I've done the Oxbridge thing, I've done the live at home at 22 thing. I understand that my life experience is not everyone's, I also understand that my life experience is grossly unfair. I choose not to let my privilege blind me. There may be many many things that my privilege makes it hard for me to understand, I am sure I have attitudes and prejudices that are just plain wrong and need changing and challenging, but God blessed me with two ears and I, to the best of my ability, choose to use them to understand the world.

David Cameron studied PPE. He must have been presented with a range of political theories so he has had alternative world views to choose from. He must know it is a possibility that young people on housing benefit are not mealy lazy scroungers.

And all this in the name of austerity. This is where the political classes  are really choosing to remain privilege blind. Spouting off rhetoric about austerity while none of them have to worry about what there children will eat tomorrow, whether they will be able to afford school shoes, how to pay the gas bill and resist the temptation to bye a wide screen TV on credit to paper over the wounds of poverty inflicted on them. They do not know what austerity means yet they use the word like it is everyone else who does not understand.

What struck me recently is that there is not actually less stuff, there's been no harvest failure, no mass loss of crops or livestock (not in uk at least) nothing real has changed since 2008, just economics and politics, just a change in hot air. There is more than enough to go round. The wealth of the richest thousand people in Britian has increased by £30bn more than the deficit and most of them pay significantly less tax as a proportion than the rest of us (with the exception of Dyson and Rowling).

It's all so very very wrong. And Mr. Milliband - I am very upset with you. Here's an idea; how about rather than joining the 'the Eastern Europeans are stealing British jobs' rhetoric you could point out that if we insisted on paying a living wage the 'competition' would disappear and workers would realise that they stood in solidarity with each other wherever they where from and that the real opponent was the powerful. If it is true (and I doubt it) that British workers are losing out on jobs because others will work for less, in worse conditions, then yes we could sort that by preventing people 'coming in' or we could not let employers exploit them then they would have no vested interest in employing them instead of those who have the power not to tolerate abuse. This should be pretty obvious you are called Labour for a reason.

We have not seen levels of inequality like the current ones since Dickensian days. Yes the levels of absolute poverty may be slightly different but inequalitie is huge and is the major problem not the deficit.

So to all politicians I would like to wake up tomorrow and not have to apologise to my daughter for the world she is going to grow up in. Just for a day could you chose to see the world through someone else's eyes. 

Unsistered

Anyone who has tried to occupy the space of being both Christian and feminist knows how uncomfortable and painful it can be. Being in spaces where you want to belong, where you should feel solidarity and instead feeling in limbo, unable to bring your full identity into those spaces. 


Hearing the word "christian" or the word "feminist" spat out with venom and almost always connected to words such as "right wing" or "radical" (quite why christians should be using the word radical as a swear word is beyond me!) is isolating. I am sure it is not only christian feminists who have these experiences. I am sure many feminists are made to feel excluded in places where they should be welcomed.


I have listened and re-listend to this a talk entitled “Theapalooza: The Rhetorical Turn in the Third Wave of Biblical Feminism” Presented by Dr. Alena Amato Ruggerio (http://www.eewc.com/audio/) because I think it contains much powerful wisdom about how we can use rhetoric to bring great understanding and freedom to ourselves and the church as a whole. In this talk she says 

"It is a feminist act to create new symbols to correspond to feminist references." 

She then explores how as christian feminists we could first identify our common experiences or references and give them symbols (that is words). She describes doing this with her students in a secular context and they developed a word which I love: "femafision" which they defined as the experience of patriarchy pitting women against each other.


So I decided that I wanted to name what I believe is a common experience for christian feminists that is the experience of being disallowed through attitudes and prejudice to exist as both christian and feminist and I want to name this as being "unsistered".


I am unsistered when my church family feel the need to dissociate themselves from the women's movement when discussing women's equality. I am unsistered when preachers use phrases such as 'unlike radical feminism...' I am unsistered when people don't ask me about work because they are nervous of my politics; I am unsistered when there is a refusal to confront patriarchy and male privilege. I am unsistered when feminist medium only ever uses the word "christian" with the phrase "right wing" or "religious fundamentalists", I am unsistered when there is language that presumes the non-existence of God, I am unsistered when people of faith are assumed to be oppressed and unenlightened. 


Please don't unsister me.

Ladies (yuk, cringe)

I can't believe I forgot this one on my post about words I don't like maybe because I get told I'm ridiculous every time I gently question its usage. I got an email today informing me that an event I was enquiring about was for ladies only. I cringed. 


So I'm really sorry if this offends anyone (actually I know it will so I want you to know that I do this because I believe it brings greater liberation to women - and transformation is painful) but I have to spell some things out because I am offended by the word Ladies and so are many other's and if the church wants to be an inclusive and welcoming place it needs to drop this language. 


I have no empirical data for this but I feel that there is sometimes an extra over-usage of this word in Christian literature/ events that are about women's equal ability to lead in church. I wonder if its one of the manifestations of our insecurities? We have to continually refer to ourselves as ladies just to make sure everyone's clear that we're still all floral and feminine as we step up into the full humanity Christ offers us. 


I'm assuming this use of the word Ladies is in ignorance of it's history and the passionate advocacy of that great Christian Feminists like Josephine Butler who fought to expose double standards in morality. 


So a brief summary of why we shouldn't use it:


1.) It's used to police women's behaviours
If your a woman can you remember being told to be ladylike when you where little? Or told not to do something because it wasn't ladylike? I think I've proved my point.


2.) It's used to remind women they are the property of men. 


3.) It is something other people assign to you and can strip from you. It is not about your own sense of personhood. This point was most powerfully driven home to me when I was at a women's group and heard a woman respond with much pain at being called a lady. She had clearly been told by others that she had not met the mark and was not a lady.


4.) I guess linked to the above but it's classist. 


5.) It is and has been used to divide women against each other


6.) Much like princess, ladies don't do anything.


7.) It holds us to a demanding moral code not the freedom of grace


8.) God never calls us lady


Someone sent me the link it's fab (http://www.vfa.us/Feminist%20Language.htm) but my two favourite quotes:


"Girls do what their mothers tell them. Ladies do what society tells them. Women make up their own minds" (Karen Kijewski, 1989).


And most importantly for the church:


"There is a difference between women and ladies. The modern parasites made ladies, but God Almighty made women" (Mother Jones, 1912)


Please do not refer to me as a lady.

Words I don't like

There are a number of words and phrases I've been thinking about recently that I don't like so I thought I'd make a record of them here. I would love this to be a growing list and to hear from you about the words and phrases you don't like.

Vulnerable: I always squirm a little bit inside when I hear people described as vulnerable. I've not been able to put my finger on it till recently, but my question is would it in many cases be more accurate to describe 'vulnerable' people as oppressed. Rather than focusing on the abilities and resources of an individual why not focus and name the forces, structures and individuals that cause the situation.

Sex Work: I was just listening to some Christian talks which twice used the term 'sex work'. AHHHHH! I'm sure this was done out of ignorance and not because these people understand the political statement they are making when they use this phrase. Please don't do these oppressed, violated and abused women the massive disservice by calling what they endure work. Equally don't call them prostitutes and blame them I know its longer but women exploited in prostitution, is little effort for you and an enormous validation of their experience.

Political correctness: The only people who ever use this phrase then say something negative. It is an attempt to reword the movement and language of equality to make it something negative. I heard someone on the radio the other day asking if political correctness had gone to far. Well if its gone too far then it was heading in the wrong direction. Anyway no one ever offers a definition of what PC means. Its this nebulous thing that is used to silence just about everything.

'As women we're told we can have it all and we can't': or words to that effect. Why not? Men have, for years been able to have carriers and be fathers, no one ever says they can't or writes countless articles about men who have got exhausted by trying to balance family life and work. Now if they're saying that people can't have everything they want then of course that's true, we all have to make sacrifices and lay down our lives for the sake of others and caring responsibilities put some fairly immediate pressure on us.

'Do you wear the trousers?': Evidently yes, you can see I am (well obviously you as readers can't but the people asking this question can) and that's my husband over there and as you can see he is also wearing trousers. Jesus didn't though he wore long floaty robes and open toed sandals.

What are the words or phrases that irritate you and why?