An Unbiased Feminist's Look at Anita Sarkeesian

Let's talk about a woman almost everyone in today's age either loves or loathes: Anita Sarkeesian. Before I tell you what I think about her, there are a few things you should know about me.

1. I am a feminist.
2. I think there are lots of problems within the feminist movement.
3. I give everything the benefit of the doubt.

So, the feminist movement has become less of a political force and more of an internet meme, sadly. As many people who are truly recognizing the problems that women face, there are even more who call themselves feminist for publicity reasons, but who don't seem to carry those same principles throughout their career. (I love you, Beyonce, but I'm calling you out for this. You too, Taylor Swift.)

And let's be real: 'manspreading'? These are not the types of battles we should be fighting right now.

One thing I do as a feminist is really take all these different points of views into account. For example, the issue of manspreading. I think it definitely speaks to a deeply-ingrained sense of what women and men are supposed to embody, but I don't think every guy on the subway is trying to perpetuate these stereotypes, and I think attacking them for it it counterproductive.

With these things in mind, I finally decided to take a look at a woman who has polarized a lot of people on this issue. Anita Sarkeesian is a prominent feminist activist, and the face of Feminist Frequency, in which she provides a feminist analysis of elements of pop culture. I first started paying attention to her with the rise of GamerGate, where she is heavily advocating or more equal treatment of women in the world of video games.

And I heard a lot of stuff about her. I heard accusations that she is a "FemiNazi" (whatever that is), ignorant to the plights of other minorities, "man-hating", etc. And finally, I decided to look up her videos, where she was supposedly spewing her "man-hate" and encouraging all these destructive ideologies in other women.

And to be completely honest? I was expecting her to be exactly what these people were accusing her of. I expected her to be angry, make biased points and disregard problems within her argument, point out every little problem with everything, and basically ruin things that I really love. That's seriously what these comments about her had set me up to believe. So finally, when I saw her two-part series on The Hunger Games, I took a deep breath and waited for her to confirm my suspicions.

And then, something beautiful happened.

This woman is SMART. She may make a point here or there that I think is a bit unfair (most notably in her video in which she applies the Bechdel test to Oscar-nominated films), but this is usually followed by an explanation about why what she is trying to do is not a judgment on particular films/TV shows/etc. She points out tropes, and why they are problematic, but also why they might show how someone has tried to create a good female character.

Basically, she just exposes how differently women are treated, and she does it really well.

And suddenly, everything kind of makes sense. Suddenly, I understand why GamerGate is such a huge problem, because even I - a proud feminist and advocate for the cause - was beginning to question women who were guilty of nothing but being intelligent and loud.

In short: You're my hero, Anita. Thank you for continuing to be loud in a world that is telling you to be quiet.

A Tale of Two Kitties (Plot Twist: One of Them is a Rabbit)

If I were to give a State of the Union address during my Fall Break on Haverford Campus, I probably would have included my frustrations with my living situation. Here’s the thing: I was being completely spoiled by m wonderful mentor. She was letting me stay in her house, use her kitchen and her laundry machine (that was NOT coin operated), and generally exist in her personal area as opposed to my very empty hall in Barclay. The only catch? I was responsible for her two pets: a cat named Pip and a rabbit named Hector.

Lessons in Love from the Resident Hopeless Romantic

Hello there, beautiful readers that I've been imagining this entire time. Today, I'm going to talk about love. And I definitely mean the knock-your-socks-off, I-Wanna-Hold-Your-Hand ballad-worthy kind of love that begins with fireworks and ends with the rest of the universe.

Emotions + College

They're very strange - these feelings I've had in the past few months. It's this weird mix of just about everything you can come up with. Sadness, happiness, anger, confusion, fear, excitement, determination...the list could go on forever.

Christmas Problems: Why this is my favorite AND my least favorite holiday.

Christmas. Even if you aren't Christian, you probably celebrate it at least a little bit. It has become the secular symbol of consumerism, and unfortunately, I am played HARDEST by the corporations who want my money.

My issue is simple. I simply have NO sense of money management when Christmas rolls around. It's absolutely ridiculous. Any other time of the year, I am hard-pressed to buy ANYTHING because I am the most frugal, penny-saving freak you will ever meet.

The Two Most Important Lessons I Have Learned

This past August, my life changed. I don't remember exactly what made me sign up for the Greatest International Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen (GISHWHES), but I do remember being excited about it for months on end. I remember getting other people involved, and I remember going into the official GISHWHES chat room and making friends with every poor, unsuspecting soul in there. (And for the record; I made TONS of friends that way and it was possibly one of the coolest parts about GISHWHES.)

The big week finally rolled around, and it was insanity. Night after night, I slaved away. I did things I never expected to find myself doing (which is kind of the point). I cried tears of frustration over making a bikini out of tea bags. I build Big Ben out of the books in our library. I made a pad and tampon giraffe with Tatiana, and then we put the fabulous thing in many strange positions trying to get the perfect photo to send to Misha.

And then, I hugged so many people, helping to break a world record of hugs. I sent complements to people I'm not terribly close to over Twitter. I wrote a letter to a soldier. I did things that just made me happy. I got so many responses with the Twitter complements; people I never expected to have much to say about me came back and told me that I had inspired them in one way or another or even just retweeted it. And that was it. I didn't get revered as a saint, I didn't receive any kind of amazing kindness or miracle or anything like that. But I honestly brightened some days. Maybe not everyone cared, but at the very least, I was able to be honest with some people who I didn't get to talk to very much and I was able to make some people smile. That was the best feeling, and I was pumped all day because of it.

That's the lesson I learned. Well, one of two important lessons that kind of go together.

1) You create your own stories. So many times, we lead boring lives. We have dreams of changing the world, or doing the impossible, etc. These dreams come from an early age, possibly at a time before we understand how hard it is to be special in a world where everyone competes for it. But I learned something about being special: it doesn't just happen to you. You don't just wake up an extraordinary human being with all kinds of facets to your personality that make others envy you. The truth is; most of us are boring. But that's totally up to us. We have the power to try new things, to travel, to hone our talents into skills, to craft new things, to learn new things. We have the ability to be people we never thought we could be. With GISHWHES, I was told to throw myself out of my comfort zone and to try new things. In doing that, I learned to be brave and ultimately, to move the things you never thought yourself to be capable of to the TOP of your to-do list. It was the best lesson I could ever have learned, and months later, I'm still doing just that.

2) The best way to be happy is to make other people happy. I swear on my life, this is the only drug worth having. "Happiness" is such a fragile thing; it will often not come all at once and once it does, it's easy to lose. But it is infectious. It is lovely and wonderful. It's like having the essence of Christmas morning in you. And so many people don't understand how to make themselves feel that. But I found the way, or at least the way that works for me. Make other people happy. Practice radical hospitality. The best, most fulfilling moment of GISHWHES was easy for me to pick out: the Twitter complements. It was because with such a simple act, something that took hardly ten minutes, I brightened some days. I felt good about myself. I was totally happy. GISHWHES encourages you to do everything you can to help others and to be the person that people need around just to spread cheer and make things brighter. My personal quote that I constantly tell myself is to "be the sunshine in someone's life". And it's difficult. Sometimes the last thing I want to do is have a smile on my face, but doing that usually makes me feel better, and maybe it makes other people feel better, too. I don't know. I might never know if the things I do truly make a difference. But I know now, because of GISHWHES, that the only way to make a difference is to try.

As my personal hero, Andrew DuCote / (Speiling) Peter Pan would say: Keep Adventuring and Stay Not A Grown-Up!

- Erica Kriner

Book Coping: How Not To Die and Take Everyone With You

This has been a tough day. I fell asleep a little past 2:00 AM last night, and I feel like I need gallons of coffee before I will feel like a normal human being. All day, a fire has been licking across my eyelids and has threatened to spill over the threshold onto my skin, burning and ripping through it like acid.

This is not healthy book coping.

Readers, I want to let you in on a few things.

1. When I walked into my first period class, I dropped to the ground and bawled for a few minutes, much to the discomfort of my fellow classmates. This episode went on for a good while and has been lurking in the background, waiting for a good time to spring back at me. I got told "It's just a book" a good ten times before people decided to leave me alone.

2. Tatiana had an attack of the ants in her clothes and described the pain that was spreading throughout her body. Unsympathetically, I explained that her situation was a perfect analogy for what I'm feeling today.

3. My logic when I am in such deep despair over a book, turns to stupidity. What happens is this progression, where my heart is battered after trying to cling to [insert dead character here] and finally realizes that the effort must be placed elsewhere. You may think the logical thing is to focus that emotional energy into something productive, but me? Definitely not. That would be much too easy for my logic to agree with such a plan. No. I have to go get another book. Oh, that's not that bad, right? Just grab a trashy teen comedy and be done with it in a day or two! Unfortunately, my life is not that simple. What my body craves is more sadness. I am the biggest book masochist I've ever met in my life. In order to move on from one tragedy, I have to progress towards another. See, the trick lies in the journey. After reading Allegiant, I was hyper-focused on the deaths of major characters that will remain unnamed. So what my heart needed was an outlet to release that pain that wasn't so scarring. Therefore, I had to find a book that allowed for the possibility of tragedy, but it wasn't a certain, impending doom. The suspense is necessary; it offers me something equally enveloping to latch onto to distract from the first book. Hopefully, the book is long enough to allow for some healing before that possible tragedy does or does not occur.

So how, you ask, does this relate to my problem at hand?

I went to the library and happened to find a book I've wanted to read for a LONG time: The Book Thief. Those of you who have read this already probably know how I'm feeling. It's not even page 20 and I am deeply concerned for my emotional wellbeing. I think this falls under the category of certain, impending doom.

Dear readers, if you don't hear from me again soon, please come find me and make sure I'm okay.
-Erica Kriner

High School Incompetence and the Troubles it Causes Motivated Students

In a perfect world, a driven student who wants challenging and rigorous course work and a high GPA could achieve just that, with the faculty and administration behind them every step of the way. Unfortunately, this is not a perfect world. And my future may suffer because of it.