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It's Wednesday again! Here's some feminist news to start your day.

Stay tuned!

Oh, hi, Monday. Here's all the feminist news I'm reading today: 

• A string of new movies write a greedy new American Dream: AO Scott writes a great piece on The Great Gatsby, The Bling Ring, Spring Breakers, and Pain and Gain as "fables of acquisition." [New York Times]

• A Greenwich Village hate crime: A man in New York gunned down a stranger this week, apparently because the victim was gay. [The Advocate] 

• Female artists took home a pile of prizes at the Billboard Music Awards, including big wins for Taylor Swift and Rihanna. [Guardian] 

• Spelling out the specific stigmas against women in power saying they have mental illness. [The Frisky]  

• How do you challenge censorship in prison? [The American Reader] 

• A Yale scholar offers a new, in-depth look at rape during the Civil War. [Women Under Siege] 

• Is tree-sitting terrorism? Proposed laws in Oregon would make certain non-violent environmental protests a felony. [Vice] 

• Feministing has a rundown of ways anyone can support domestic workers who are organizing themselves for rights. [Feministing]

• Sailor Moon turned femininity into a literal weapon: In praise of "magical girl" TV shows. [Autostraddle]  

• Boobs on Facebook: They're only banned if they're real, says Facebook. [Daily Beast] 

What's on your radar? Post other good reads to the comments. 

Baltimore feminist group FORCE took the world by surprise last December when they launched a line of fake Victoria's Secret, dropping underwear emblazoned with phrases like "Consent is Sexy" and "Ask First" at Victoria's Secrets around the US and promoting the fake Pink Loves Consent line on the internet. The spoof came off brilliantly, using a well-coordinated "feminist Facebook army" to hijack Victoria Secret's social media and broadcast the a discussion of consent to millions of mainstream shoppers. Last week, I talked with FORCE organizers Rebecca Nagle and Hannah Brancato about what they learned from the Pink Loves Consent campaign, how Facebook and Twitter have censored their spoof, and the details on their next action, a Valentine's Day protest that will install a temporary monument to rape survivors in Washington DC. 

 

BITCH: What choices did you make while planning Pink Loves Consent that made it so wildly successful? 

HANNAH BRANCATO:  The big decision was that we couldn't sell the underwear. This is a spoof, we're using Victoria's Secret's trademark, so we couldn't legally sell anything. There was all of this intense energy around the project when it first launched but the only thing people could think of doing was buying the underwear. 

REBECCA NAGLE: The first thing they asked was, 'Where can I buy this?" And I think it was powerful to come back and say, "You can't buy it, it's an idea." Instead of sending people to a checkout cart, we're sending people to resources, to saying, "Here's a zine you can make." 

Making matters worse—way worse—for young people online and for the world in general is a new page on Facebook called "12 year old slut meme's" [sic], dedicated to slut-shaming and general douchebaggery. Since the page launched last month, Facebook users have asked that it be taken down as a violation of the site's hate speech policy, but as of the publishing of this post it's going strong with 214,489 fans.

Not only does the ad offensively use women's bodies to sell a product it, also needlessly sexualizes a non-sexual product. It's ChapStick for god's sake! And now I have to think of this lady's ass every time I rub it on my lips? What? I didn't want that!

Bringing you fine, feminist work from around the web!

• Bitch YA Blogger Jessica Stites follows up on police response to Ms.' petition demanding they apologize for having a woman who reported her rape fined.
• Queerty shares a video and list, "Just In Case You Forgot Why The Family Research Council Is A Hate Group."
• Monica at TransGriot provides a history lesson about the 1921 Tulsa Race Riot. (Trigger warning for discussion of racism and physical violence.)
• Bitch contributor Sady Doyle reports on Friday's protest of last week's shameful "not guilty" verdict at the Raw Story.
• Shakesville's Melissa McEwan comments on the latest fail by the New York Times. (Quotable: "This column smells like barf.")
• Tom at Original Plumbing talks about the Lambda Literary Awards and being an out artist.
• Check out V-Girls' latest project: collecting photo, video and text submissions for the I Am an Emotional Creature workshops they'll be leading with Eve Ensler in South Africa.
• The Guardian reports on author Naipaul's eyeroll-inducing insistence that no woman could write as well as him.
• Feministe's Clarisse gives us the rundown on feminist sci-fi awards!
• Bitch contributor Emily Manuel blurbs about the "fauxtreversy" around baby Storm's biological sex being a secret and the "imposing their ideology" accusation at Tiger Beatdown.
• At AlterNet, Laura Rena Murray explains the wrongheaded practice of police pointing to condom-carrying as evidence of being a sex worker... and the oft-dismissed bill that would prevent it.
• Mother Jones reports on the FIFA soccer scandal.
• WTF? Feministing discusses Cadbury's new ad, which compares Naomi Campbell and a chocolate bar.

Any reactions to the pieces we've shared? What else have you been reading?

Friday is linkday!

• Bitch Leadership Council member and Feminist Coming Out Day organizer Lena Chen shares her experiences writing a popular sex blog as a college student on Salon.
• RH Reality Check passes on a video of parents of a killed gay soldier speaking out for marriage equality in Minnesota.
• Marcia Herring evaluates Degrassi's surprisingly (and infuriatingly) poor recent address of date rape at Feministing and Bitch Flicks.
• Bitch contributor Alyx Vesey reviews BrassBastardz' Timeline for Scratched Vinyl.
• HuffPo discusses the argument of whether Facebook postings can constitute fireable offenses.
• Over at Jezebel, Dodai Stewart talks about those ridiculous "Are white people being discriminated against?" polls and shares a powerful clip from the upcoming documentary, Dark Girls, about being black with dark skin in the USA.
• Also at Jezebel, Jenna Sauers reports on Miley Cyrus' recent tweets against Urban Outfitters' anti-gay politics and knock-off fashions.
• Mounia talks about the media's continued depiction of Dominique Strauss-Kahn as the victim on Feministe. ColorLines rounds up the implicit messages of this coverage.
• Also at ColorLines, Thoai Lu reports on a shocking incident by the D.C. Metro Police against an elder in a wheelchair. Trigger warning for video and description of physical violence.
• Bitch contributor Jarrah Hodge reviews Feminism for Real, which is now for sale at Bitch Mart, for her blog, Gender Focus.
• Bitch contributor Emily Manuel talks about that Rapture that didn't happen, and why we're compelled to joke about it, at GlobalComment.
• AfterEllen gives us the news on The United States of Tara and Nurse Jackie. Preview: Only one of these shows is getting another season.
• Cross-posted at Her Blueprint and Racialicious, Simba Russeau writes of Algerian activist Randa and her book of interviews, Memoirs of Randa the Trans.
• Also at Racialicious: "No, Joan Walsh, racial criticism does not equal 'identity politics.'"

Thoughts? What else have you been reading online?

Have you ever thought about Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, naked? Well, he might be thinking about you naked, and FalseFlesh wants to help him with his dreams. If his dreams are to look at your naked body without your permission. There's an app for that! (Links after the jump are potentially NSFW)

[Warning: MASSIVE SPOILERS for the movie Catfish FOLLOW. It will be much less fun to watch if you have read the spoilers. However, if you don't plan to see it, have already had it spoiled and/or don't care about spoilers, read on.]