feminist blogs

My gay boyfriend Merv and I, caught on the scene (well more like at my apartment) probably after getting our thizzle dance on.

Now this is really really bad. It is so bad that I can't even believe I am admitting it. And not just because of the rampant misogyny in rap music videos (which is over the top, grotesque and unapologetic), but because I am considered a hip-hop head that should stick to the *real* shit mayne! There is just something about certain mainstream pop-like rap tracks that get under my skin and stuck in my head and before I know it I am head bopping with the best of them and sometimes even wearing my hat to the side with some electro-glasses on.

Mind you most of what I am listening to isn't even hip-hop, there might be some rapping but it is basically R&B and it has a groove that I can't resist. For example I love this Lil Wayne track with Lloyd, it just gets me up and singing. And it isn't just the super mainstream stuff, I like whatever young people are listening to all over the country. I just left the Bay and although it has seen its heyday, boy can I get down with some hyphy music, like E-40 or Mac Dre.

I have written about negotiating my feminism with my love for hip-hop, so this is something I have given a lot of thought to. And frankly, sometimes I can handle it, but most of the time I am thinking, was that really necessary? And there are moments that are so over the top (like Nelly's Tip Drill track) which is just too much for me and I am grossly offended and ready to boycott the artist.

Does this music have sexist attitudes in it? It sure can and a lot of times yes. But it is also what my friends and my community listen to and not all of it is horridly offensive. Some of it is just cute. I actually got into commercial rap by hanging out with lesbians (well that and working in public schools for 5 years). I am not going to make a case for some type of reverse signification where we are reclaiming the music. We aren't, we are human and we like good beats with cheesy bass lines and corny lyrics and relate to the universal themes of sexual attraction, love and heart break.

I have no idea how I will continue to reconcile my love for mainstream commercial hip-hop since I am aware of its nefarious corporate packaging, mistreatment of members and a form of music that people of my generation (from the golden years of hip-hop) consider to be responsible for ruining hip-hop as we know it. However, I will make the argument that I don't think rap/hip-hop is any more sexist than other male dominated forms of music. So maybe your guilty pleasure is cock rock and mine is faux mainstream gangsta' rap. Either way, if you see me dancing somewhere and you are like, "omg is that Samhita from FEMINISTING" just know I recognize the potential contradiction, but also, like everyone else like to have a good time, dance with my friends and have taken myself to the task of mastering the balancing act of hip-hop love and feminist self-preservation.

Most of the time when we write about photographing people on the street, we're talking about dudes who are cat-callers and harassers. But part of my daily internet consumption -- in between the New York Times and feminist blogs and everything I read for my job -- is a healthy dose of street fashion blogs. From Monterey to Minneapolis, Tokyo to Helsinki, many major cities (and some smaller towns) have a dedicated street photographer who sets out every day to document the local style. (Perhaps the most well-known street-fashion blog is the Sartorialist -- not my personal fave, but a classic. For an overview of lots of cities, check out Street Peeper.)

I like that these are fashion photographs featuring people who are not bone-thin, Photoshopped, or posed like marionettes. For someone like me with a weakness for fashion, street-style blogs seem like a lesser evil to the glossy fashion magazines, which always intersperse articles about clothes with articles trying to convince me that five almonds and an espresso is the breakfast of emaciated champions. While every street-fashion photographer is an editor -- in that s/he chooses which people to snap on the street -- I like to think that it's a bit more unmediated than Vogue's fashion spreads, which only highlight clothes from the latest absurdly expensive designer collections.

Street-fashion blogs indulge the voyeurist in me, and allow me to examine the finer points of how people present themselves to the world. (I especially love how the Scandinavian street-fashionistas play with androgyny.) Plus, I like getting my superficial style fix from real people -- people on a budget, people who don't look perfect in every photo, people who are their own personal stylist. I especially like seeing women with real bodies -- with bow legs and freckles and little boobs and frizzy hair and round bellies and all manner of tiny quirks -- being portrayed as fashionable and awesome.

Of course, there's a reason this is a guilty pleasure. If I'm totally honest, most of these blogs don't really live up to the ideal I just laid out. Yes, they feature real people, not Photoshopped models. But it's still about fashion. Which, even if it's purchased in a thrift store rather than a designer boutique, is a superficial thing. These blogs still manage to almost exclusively portray the stylish residents of their cities who are young, white, able-bodied, and class-privileged. It's a real stretch to say that any of the New York street-fashion blogs, for example, even kind of manage to capture a diverse cross-section of style in the city. These are not sites that seek out types of style and beauty that run counter to the images we get in the glossies. What the blogs portray is really just a twist on the mainstream.

As Miriam wrote in her intro to this series, "We at Feministing believe there are ways to maintain a critical eye towards these (un)feminist things while still enjoying them." So I suppose that's my mantra here. And in the meantime, if someone out there knows of (or wants to start!) a street-fashion blog that actually makes a concerted effort to highlight the awesome style of non-white, non-skinny, non-able-bodied fashionistas, let me know about it! I'd love to add it to my daily reading, guilt-free.

I know this is a bad (un)feminist guilty pleasure. And I don't even have a good excuse, like Miriam did in talking about reggaeton and feeling some kind of cultural affinity to it. But ever since I discovered spanx (recommended by another feminist blogger actually) I have been addicted to them. What are they? Basically, a girdle, a "power panty" if you will, something that holds in all in so you can put those super ultra tight unforgiving dresses on.

Alright, full confession. I think I am sexy with or without spanx. But feeling sexy everyday is sometimes difficult. I have things to do, like go to work, blog, eat, hang out with my friends, etc. What I don't have time to do is obsess over how I like in this or that which I do my best not to do as a feminist, but it is hard when you are constantly inundated by images of thinness, whiteness and richness. And frankly, if you saw me on the regular you wouldn't think I give it that much thought, I dress pretty casually. But when Friday night rolls around and I want to go out on the town, sometimes I like to look extra fancy and sometimes it feels better to wear something that holds it all in. It just gives me that ounce more confidence. So I go from "damn I look good" to "DAMN, I look HELLA good."

According to this post on Gawker, I should stfu and go to the gym. But you know what? I go to the gym. Mainly for stress reduction, but I go and it doesn't make me look like a super model. It just makes me look like me. Which is fine. But I don't appreciate the insinuation that I am cheating or eating too much and as a result I need spanx. What I am doing is functioning in a world that hates fat people so much that young girls don't eat and even a woman as strong as me, sometimes doesn't feel like she looks super. It is normal and I don't hate myself for it, one bit!

So yeah, I wear spanx. They are simple, they are comfortable and they avoid giving me that thigh chafe us thick legged gals get when our thighs rub against each other all night long. I understand why it is not perfect that a strong, beautiful woman such as myself has days when I don't feel fully fab about my body, but shit I am human.