My Vagina Monologue

So, for the Vagina Monologues this year, we've been given the task of writing our own monologue. Here is mine. Though this may seem impersonal, this atrocity has been own my mind for quite a few months. It has moved me to consume less and only buy from second hand shops. My heart has been consumed by this problem, and I'm not really sure how to fix it.

We use clothing to show the world ourselves. Dressing however you wish has been the mark of individuality. It’s the rebellion to dress codes, uniforms, even communism. It is been deemed art, an expression of our inner soul. Weeks in New York, Streets in California, stations on TV have been devoted to help you express yourself. Dressing fashionably, wearing tee shirts and jean, the inner hippy style—all are expressions of who you are.

Who am I?

I am complicit in slavery, an accomplice in the exploitation of women, and so are you.

Just as the style of clothing we wear is an expression, so is every garment we put on ourselves. The artful fashions we so desire, our individuality, are stitches of exploitation of an overworked, underpaid woman all over our body.

Don’t care for high fashion?

Don’t worry; your five dollar tee-shirt from a discount store is stitched from the same sweat, blood and labor of this woman. How else do you think a shirt gets that cheap?

We enjoy our cheap clothes; we aren’t the ones paying. She is.

She’s paying with her hope for a better life, only to be an indentured servant in a job that she can never leave. Her bed is housed in a factory, her meals are prepared by a factory, and her healthcare is administered by her master, her job—if you can even call it that.

Is a job a place you can never leave? Hers is a place that has barbed wire, keeping her in, not unwanted visitors out. She breathes in particles that ruin her lungs because she can never go home; her home is her work.

No choices, no way out.

Her body becomes her only bargaining tool for a promotion—not only her labor, and time, but where her boss rapes and sexually assaults her under the false promise of better pay and a way out—this never happens. She is a slave to her meager wages, wages she cannot live on, wages that kill her physically and emotionally.

She makes it possible for us to have a $5 tee shirt, for us to have individuality, for us to have fashion week, and style.

She must be worth less than us, less than me, less than you.

She never has individuality, or fashion week, and forgot about style. Her individuality is checked at the guarded factory door, washed away by the toxic chemicals to make your cardigan, and capris, and torn away from her by the fiber particles that make their way into her lungs.

Yes, every stitch in our clothes is made by the woman on the hard cement factory floor who is exploited, raped, and victim to our self expression and individuality. Our clothes are our proud display that we are complicit in her slavery for our fashion.

Slavery Stiched into the Fabric of My Clothes

Someone told me over the weekend they were concerned about finding and understanding religion because they want to know if they should do good for fellow humanity or just go on with their own self interests. They called this a crisis of faith.

My answer is this:

My religion is an unyielding love for humanity. Even if there is not some divine connection between us, such as Adam and Eve, or a prerequisite of good deeds to enter heaven or to end reincarnation, we are all still connected. We share this planet together, we are all dependent on each other in some aspect, our actions' ripple effects can be felt infinitely beyond what we will ever know. So hinging one's humanitarianism on its need to get into heaven is silly.

On the other side of the world, a woman works tirelessly in a sweatshop, where she earns barely enough money to eat so we can wear the season's best fashions. She eats, sleeps, and breathes work, so we can have cheap clothes. We send our factories to foreign counties exploiting their labor, resources, and health. We do this because their labor, natural resources, and well-being is worth less than our own. We build machines and train soldiers to kill another human being who believes they are right, just as we do. This soldier probably has a spouse and child who they are trying to project from the "evils" of the world.

I thought about my shoes the other day--
I have 30 pairs of shoes: a young boy trekking through trash in Africa has none.
I eat everyday, 3 times a day: a family of four, just down the street is lucky if they eat once a day.
I wish I could have a new sweater: some people don't have enough clothes to shield them from the elements.
I wish I could repaint my room: some people don't have their own room, some don't have heat, or a lock on their down, or electric, or clean water...or shelter.
I complain about waking up early for classes: a little girl in a developing country isn't allowed to go to school.


Thing about it, we could not live without our fellow human beings,--what we eat, what we wear, what we think, what we drive, what entertainment we seek, has been touched by others in humanity. My comfortableness is at the expense of some people's lives. If I just give a little more, share a little more, felt a little less entitled--things could be different for that shoeless boy, or the illiterate little girl.

Why does this connection matter? Because our salvation (our life) rests in others' hands. We all share this dilemma-the dependence on the other.

To some degree, the homeless, the sick, the poor, the disenfranchised, the abused are our responsibility. By looking at humanity not through religion's eyes but in regards to this other connectedness, it makes this responsibility all the more greater.

"Talk Bout' Your Revolution, It's Independence Day"

So often it is the “tragedy-that-stops-us-in-our-tracks” that allows an ageless incessant crisis to finally enter local discussion. The crisis which I speak of is domestic violence. In Lebanon County a phenomena is occurring; the taboo topic of domestic violence has suddenly reached the dialogue of our community. Because of my job, rarely a day goes by without partner violence entering my thoughts. It is as if domestic violence is a new crisis of Lebanon, but in actuality, this crisis has always existed. It is neither a novel concept, nor is it a recent trend as headlines have dubbed it.

The conversations surrounding Meleanie Hain, a woman who was murdered by her husband-who then killed himself, is my frustration with my community. I am not writing to discuss my personal thoughts on guns rights or permits to carry as that conversation should not enter into this conversation. Many find it ironic that Meleanie Hain was killed by a gun because she was the famous woman who advocated for her own gun rights at a soccer game. The real irony is that so many find it ironic that a woman was murdered by a gun in a domestic violence situation. This was an intimate partner murder that happened to be committed with a gun. I say this because nearly any object could have been the lethal weapon. The sad reality is that her murder is not all that distinctive in the realm of women murdered—as 1 in 3 women murdered know their perpetrator intimately (compared to just 3% of male victims). And about the gun—in Pennsylvania, 60% of domestic violence fatalities involve the victim being shot.

Articles in the newspaper noted that Meleanie Hain had discussed with her lawyer leaving and obtaining a Protection From Abuse order—she never did. Unfortunately, this is a glaring example the complexities of leaving an abusive situation. It is hard to know the particulars of her situation, but she is now one of many disturbing statistics about women who died at the hands of an intimate partner.

Since the community has taken interest in the recent domestic violence deaths, one should view this as a call to action. Saying this is not an attempt to politicize Meleanie Hain’s death or take a tragedy and use it for some agenda. Domestic violence is like heart disease or breast cancer—it affects women of all backgrounds, races, and classes—and moreover, intimate partner violence will happen to 1 in 4 women in her lifetime. But unlike heart disease or cancer, the solution is not found in tireless scientific research, but is in all of us—it is in our control.

Ending domestic violence will never be an easy task, but has to begin somewhere.

Awareness is the first step—talk about in your churches, schools, social clubs, etc.—because if you ignore a problem you only allow it to flourish.

Change social attitudes towards women—domestic violence is long rooted in the idea that women can be property of their spouse and unequal to their male counterparts.

Know the warning signs of a potentially abusive situation: controlling/obsessive/stalking/isolating/verbal abuse/possessiveness/mind-games/and physical abuse.

Get help if you are or could become a potential abuser through counseling or other means. Get help if you find yourself in an abusive situation. Support friends, family, or co-workers who find themselves in an abusive situation.

Hold your elected officials, police officers, and school district accountable on laws and initiatives concerning intimate partner violence.

Dear Mr. President, I am dissapointed in you.

As most already know Barack Obama just won the Nobel Peace Prize. I am not really sure about how I feel about him receiving it so soon in his presidency. I mean, isn't it a little premature? So far he really hasn't done more than any "good" president should have done, or is doing--passing good laws, taking on long over-due initiatives. The last president to receive the Nobel Peace Prize while in office was Woodrow Wilson. He created the League of Nations, the first idea of an international dialogue between nations and was instrumental in the Treaty of Versailles. Has Barack Obama done anything close to that? Other than paying lip service to the way good diplomacy should be conducted, has he actually followed through?

I don't mean to say that Obama isn't a great motivator for peace. But, also in the news with him receiving the Prize was his refusal to meet with the Dalai Lama to keep the Chinese happy. This is not something a Nobel laureate should do. It is nothing more than ignoring a wrongfully disenfranchised group of people for selfish gain. It is in the U.S.'s economic interests to keep the Chinese happy. It's like ignoring atrocities happening in Africa, or unyielding taking the Israeli side in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. His actions of not meeting with the Dalai Lama showcase that he did not rise above to save human rights--I don't understand how a person "fighting for peace" would do this. When running for president he told all of us his administration wouldn't refuse to talk with anyone--meaning unpopular groups in the middle east and Korea. I don't understand, is the Dalai Lama so much worse?

Crisis of the Eternal Opimist and the Case of Lynching

Yesterday in African American literature we discussed lynching. I wish I had something wise and academic to say about the whole matter, but I don't. I can only get at it from an emotional stand point. I'm not going to pretend I understand the African American experience in regards to lynching. I will never know or understand fully what it feels like to live in a country that did this for sport to one's own race. I can only understand it in regards to me. This is not a self absorbed idea, I think it would be minimizing to discuss a feeling that is foreign to me.

I feel disgusted to be a white American. So many of the privileges I receive is a result of heinous treatment African Americans received. I notice I write that in the past-tense by really, it is never ending. You'd think lynching, murder for sport,really, is a thing of the past. In class, we learned about actual accounts of lynching, masses of people would gather to watch the process of an untried man being decapitated, finger by finger, his skull broken, and then hung. What makes it all the more worse, these people who watched treated this as a family outing. People dressed in their Sunday best, with picnic baskets in hand celebrating a hanging of a "Negro." You think this happened decades ago, we have evolved. No, we haven't. In 1998, James Byrd, Jr. was beaten savagely to the point of unconsciousness, chained to the back of a pickup truck by his neck, and dragged for miles over rural roads outside the town of Jasper, TX, and then was decapitated. What does that say about us? What does that say about our society?

I am outraged. I am angry. Never have a felt so helpless. I don't even know what to do. As an advocate for social justice, I always looked on the bright side--the eternal optimistic. Ha, it seems so naiive now.

Never has anything shaken me to my core so much. My thought was always, "even on the worst days, people are still mostly more good than bad." This idea has stayed with me despite knowing the Holocaust, violence against women worldwide, war for greed, mass killings-- horrible, horrible things. Some how I still managed to believe people were mostly good, perhaps misguided, but mostly good. I have put up with extreme realism of professors, and denied that people are evil thus the need for government.

Was I wrong all along? Are people really that horrible? Nothing has ever made me question my world view like this has. I don't know why...why is this so special? I don't like this feeling, the feeling that I was wrong about humanity all along. And if I am wrong, and people are really horrible then what's the point in fighting?

9/11

(Let's pretend I posted this yesterday.)

Eight years ago the United States experienced a tragedy that most of the world experiences everyday, terrorism. I am not writing this entry to minimize the horrific experience of innocent people and their families. The aftermath of the September 11th attacks was felt by everyone in the country. Suddenly, our little world of safety, perhaps false safety was shaken to the core. The fragility of life, and the harsh reality of the world we live in was exposed. In a small way we became citizens of the world that day. Sadly, even the wealthiest of countries, that has not been attacked on its own soil since the Pearl Harbor (and that was during wartime) had to learn it was not above the atrocities of the world.

Most people live their whole life the way we lived for one day. In America we have a tendency to ignore or have become desensitized to events like Mosque bombings in the Middle East, suicide bombings in Israel and Palestine.

Some terrorism is less overt, as it is not marked by a pivotal event. Instead it is so ongoing that is not one event as a reminder the world is not safe, but a lifestyle one must employ to stay safe and alive--that is their terrorism. In Africa, everyday people live in fear of rebels invading their village, destroying their shack-homes, raping their mothers and daughters, their children being kidnapped and forced to become soldiers. Moreover, this invasion is accompanied by starvation, inadequate sanitation, poverty and illiteracy.

Terrorism of these people is so unknown Westerners. We think that is over there--this is not us. If we have learned nothing else from 9/11, we should learn that their terrorism is our terrorism.

It Will Build Character...

I don't really know what inspired me to write about this, but I had this strong urge to write about about the Summer of 2006. That Summer is what I warmly recollect as the Summer of character building. I learned a lot about myself and I began to understand the world better as well.

I was in need of a full-time job that Summer, and with nothing falling into lap, I looked elsewhere. My dad owns his own construction business so I asked him if I could work with him. I assumed he'd let me do what I did over Winter break--working in the office selling extra materials on E-bay.

No, that was not what I did.

My dad thought it would be a great experience for me to work out in the field with the guys (though this may seem like a stereotype, that all construction workers are men, but no, all his employees were men at the time). He thought it would "build character." I protested and for most of the Summer I tried to weasel my way out of working actually on a job site with the guys.

I managed to be the "materials runner" most of the time. This consisted of picking up materials at a warehouse (where no women were around) in the beat up blue Ford truck that had two gas tanks to switch back and forth from and had an extended bed (Fortunately, the CD player worked.), then delivering the materials to the guys at the construction site(also, where no women were in sight). My dad's business specifically is commercial heating, air conditioning, and plumbing, so often the materials I delivered was large pieces of duct work. My dad made a point to tell me that the guys were not to be disrupted from work to help me unload the truck. Yes, I was to do it alone. I have to tell you, this did not go well. A lot of the times, despite my protests, the guys would always help me and I ended up trying my hardest to keep my dad from finding out.

I could go on and on about the mini adventures I accrued that Summer delivering materials. Like the times I got lost going to different warehouses all over central PA--I learned where all sorts of highways were, that I got funny looks when I asked for some very specific toilet part at the service counter, that this one time I drove the pick-up from the other side of Harrisburg to Lebanon with 10 toilets in the back shifting around that were to be placed in the movie theater at the Lebanon Mall, and when my sister came up to visit, her and I began the "sister initiation" of backing the pick-up truck into a loading dock jamming the tailgate, and then our dad blaming one of the guys. So far, 3 of 5 sisters have done this. Yes, that was the fun part of my job. But sometimes, there was no way of getting out of working at the job site, doing work the guys did. --I think my dad enjoyed me doing this most.

The first time I worked on site was with my Uncle at the Great Escape Theater priming copper pipping for the bathrooms. My hands became somewhat rough and cut up because the copper pipe ends were sharp and the wool was abrasive. But I got over it and learned how to solder pipe (not that my Uncle ever let me do it), cut pipe, learn all sorts of pipe names, and test for leaks. My dad's guys never treated me with disrespect, but I could tell some of the guys in the other companies thought I was in the way and that I shouldn't be there. This was a constant feeling I had all Summer.

My favorite experience was with painting, not because it was fun, but because the experience I had with one of the guys. My dad wanted me to paint at his newest property with Tom, an older grandfatherly type guy who has worked with my dad for awhile and who I had installed and caulked sinks with at the Theater earlier in the Summer. When we arrived at the house the guy I was supposed to work with that I never met was already upstairs. Now mind you, we are painting the interior walls of a house; it's not like fitting pipe. When I reached the top of the steps with Tom, he tells the guy, "your help has arrived!"
He looks me up and down as says to Tom, "Are you serious?"
Then Tom tells him that, "this is Rob's daughter."
They guy says, "Oh..."
Then suddenly he whole demeanor changed.

But really, it's painting a freaking wall. How is this a daunting task that young ladies can't tackle? There's not even a learning curve, I've painted before!
This guy, for the whole Summer outwardly showed his annoyance for working with me every time my dad stuck us together...sadly, since he was as unskilled as I (This was the irony of it all) this happened often. The best was stacking wood, somehow he assumed I wasn't fit to do this and grumbled and huffed the whole time. By the end, he huffed less and actually talked to me about my plans for school...I think by the end he at least respected me.

That is not the only time it sucked being a woman that Summer. This guy, at least my dad knew so he didn't do anything belligerent. However, while I was working at the Theater something happened that I really don't like talking about. It makes me so uncomfortable that I didn't even tell my dad, only after the fact did I tell my Uncle. I was trying my hardest to fit in, be somewhat respected as "one of the guys," in so far as that was possible. I didn't slack off, I carried the heavy stuff without being asked, I tried to be efficient--I didn't play up being a girl.

One day I had to walk out to the truck to get something and a group of men working on the side of the building began whistling and catcalling. I felt ridiculous. What was worse was these guys didn't speak English, there was no way of calling them out on it. But, really if I could have, I don't think I would have. It wasn't flattering or charming. I was trying to work and those men reminded me that a construction site was still a man's world. They took all the uncomfortableness that was bubbling inside me and brought it to the surface. I hated being there, I prayed none of the other guys heard them, I wanted to be taken seriously. They put me in my place,their tactic worked. I was not a construction worker, I was a woman who didn't belong.

It took me a long time to get over it. I don't know how I managed to walk past them to go back inside. I wished I was strong enough to do something, anything. But I wasn't, I was terrified. It was first hand objectification. I'd like to say from then on I was stronger woman. I didn't take shit.

It took me a long time to grow into the feminist that I am. I am certain that the Summer of 2006 helped to become who I am. It certainly was character building. I wouldn't trade that Summer for anything. I am forever thankful for my dad making me do the dirty work. That was my summer of 06.