I have to tell you I’ve been annoyed with the public (read: Male) reaction to the Sex in the City movie. I’ve not seen it myself and I’m not terribly interested, but that’s not really the point. The point is the enthusiastic and thoughtless contempt of feminine things.

I realize there’s probably not a lot of deep meaning or redeeming social value or great artistic merit in said movie, I’m sure it glorifies our unsustainable consumer culture, questionable social morality, and American self-obsession. And if these moaning men objected to the movie based on those issues, I’d be peachy keen. But that’s not it at all, no, men object because it’s a movie that is apologetically feminine, it’s about pretty dresses and relationships and love and female lives. And they feel it is necessary to loudly proclaim that they’d rather have their toenails yanked out with pliers than go to that movie.

Why? Well, obviously interest in womanly things is humiliating and degrading. Of course. (more…)

Apparently, women are denied full membership privileges at an exclusive country club in Phoenix, Arizona.

What? Are you kidding me?! Do we have cooties or something?

Can you imagine the political fallout if the Phoenix Country Club refused to admit blacks as full members? Especially considering John McCain’s son is a member of the club?

(more…)

I live on several acres of bushland. Australians hate it when I say this, but most winter mornings, we have kangaroos in our front yard. Today there were five of them, six if you count the joey in the pouch. It’s not at all uncommon for us to have echidnas in the garden. Our dog loves trying to get at them; but echidnas have a very good defense system, they burrow into the ground and expose the sharp spines along their back and wait out the threat. Once our dog had an echidna trapped under the car for three hours. (Yes, it took us that long to go out and see why she was making such a racket.) We locked up the dog and had to wait for another 3 hours before the echidna thought it was save enough to move.

And then there are other animals that aren’t so nice. Take the hunstman spider - they won’t hurt you, not really, but they are big and they move fast. It’s very scary when you’re driving along and suddenly see a huntsman out of the corner of your eye. The only thing scarier is looking back five seconds later and not seeing it.

We also have snakes. In fact, in February, we had a snake in the house. This wasn’t any ordinary garden snake, this was a brown snake, the second most venomous land snake in the world. (more…)

The bloggernacle is awash with posts on same-sex marriage, the First Presidency’s upcoming letter and the demise of traditional marriage. Over and over I read comments about how ‘traditional marriage’ is under attack. How gays and lesbians marrying will ‘destroy marriage.’ How we have to fight to defend ‘traditional marriage’ and the family from variously, the homosexual agenda, the evils of the world, the forces of Satan, etc. etc. etc. But the sad (glad) news is that Traditional marriage is dying or dead in much of the world and has been for a long time. And its demise has nothing to do with gays or lesbians. It was us women who killed it, forced its reinvention and started us down this ’slippery slope’ to where we are today. (more…)

by Ayla

I was hoping the church would sit this one out. According to the Salt Lake City Tribune, “the LDS Church is asking California Mormons to support a proposed constitutional amendment that would recognize only marriages between a man and a woman.”

As a Californian this affects me. So here’s my take on it. In the Journal of Discourses, which is not official LDS doctrine I know, Brigham Young stated that a white person conceiving a child with a black person was a sin punishable by death and that this would always be so.

OK, so obviously it wasn’t always so. The whole gay marriage issue is the same thing to me. It’s a civil rights issue, period. The current presidency consists of older men, they’ve been raised to think that gay marriage is wrong and this is their opinion. However, I do not believe nor will you ever convince me that condemning homosexual marriages and families is coming from God. (more…)

This one is just too good for the side bar …….

If you live in Utah, you’ve probably heard of the Wasatch Back relay, which took place this weekend. The race starts in Logan and ends in Park City. Each runner is part of a twelve-person (or six-person, if you’re really crazy) team and runs three legs of the 180-mile distance between the two cities.

(more…)

Blue is a regular reader and infrequent commenter on FMH. She thought these tips might be of interest to some in this community.

Most of us can not afford to go 100% organic. Looking for a solution? Focus on just those foods that come with the heaviest burden of pesticides, chemicals, additives and hormones. Whenever possible, deploy your organic spending power to buy organic versions. See the list below to find the top 12 foods to eat organic.
Can’t find organic versions of the organic foods listed below? The list offers safer alternatives that contain similar valuable vitamins and minerals. (more…)

As part of my self-directed pregnancy reading program, I am just finishing up Marsden Wagner’s (M.D., M.S.) book, Born in the USA: How A Broken Maternity System Must Be Fixed to Put Women and Children First. Fascinating read, actually, though I think many OB’s would find it unnecessarily provocative. I’ve not actually been able to find any OB reviews of the book (if you know of any good ones, let me know), but from what I can tell, the book is solidly grounded in good science and research. I especially like the later chapters where he outlines his thoughts on what needs to be done to make family-friendly, evidence-based maternity care standard in the U.S., and how to do it.

However, this post is not intended to be a thorough review of the book or the issues involved. All I want to do here is re-post a list of patients’ rights that Wagner reviews in his chapter 7 of the book (more…)

Earlier this week, an adult member of a local sports team shot his girlfriend and then himself. Some members of the team wanted to wear black armbands to remember him at their next game; the team president asked that they didn’t do so, because he thought it would send the wrong message about violence towards women. I was listening to a brief discussion on local ABC radio (the Australian equivalent of NPR) when a woman called up. She identified herself as a friend of the family. And then she said, and I paraphrase: The media is not telling the whole truth. When the truth emerges about who and what this woman was, and what she was doing, their opinion would change. The man was the real victim in this. (The clear implication was: She deserved it.)

The female radio host asked, “Is violence against women ever justified?” The family friend replied: “He was never violent against any woman. Never.” Huh? So shooting her isn’t violent?

Are we our own worst enemy when it comes to violence against women? How do we go about changing attitudes?

If you haven’t heard it yet and would like to, here’s the link to the interview mfranti, Lisa & I had with krcl:

RadioActive! June 18 Feminist Mormon Housewives
They’re not your mamma’s Relief Society!

by lessie

Today is Juneteenth. Go to the website for more specific information, but basically, on June 19, 1865, in Galveston, Texas, the last African American slaves were officially recognized as free citizens. Now obviously, there were still problems. Many slaves at that time had no land, no possessions, no connections except those with their former owners, but many modern African Americans recognize this as their own Independence Day.

(more…)

I got in a bit of trouble yesterday in my glib and hilarious (yuk yuk) way for making fun of “John McGeezer’s wrinkly little hands”, and since, I’ve been contemplating the nature of humor n stuff.

On the one hand, I do believe that there is value in political correctness. Like everything, it can be, and sometimes is taken to stupid extremes. But in the end it comes down to good manners and treating each other with kindness and dignity. All of which I think are vitally important.

On the other hand, humor is funny precisely because it’s all about the stuff that makes us squirm, uncomfortable stuff like religion and race and gender, and bodily functions. All of which are dicey even sometimes impossible to approach in a mannerly way. So humor steps in to relieve the tension.

Humor and Manners are in perpetual tug-o-war with each other, manners goes too far and we ignore unpleasant truths, complexity and joy drain out of everything. Humor goes too far and we trample heedlessly on each other’s sensitive spots, resentment and ugliness abound. (more…)

i’m so excited. i asked fmoc to do a guest post months ago but her busy teaching schedule kept her away…until now. she’s full of brilliant ideas and i hope that y’all are welcoming and mindful of the sensitive nature of this topic. mf

…Why must women stand divided?
Building the walls that tear them down?
Jill-of-all-trades
Lover, mother, housewife, friend, breadwinner
Heart and spade
A woman is a ritual
A house that must accommodate
A house that must endure
Generation after generation
Of wind and torment, of fire and rain
A house with echoing rooms
Closets with hidden cries
Walls with stretchmarks
Windows with eyes

Short, tall, skinny, fat
Pregnant, married, white, yellow, black, brown, red
Professional, working-class, aristocrat
Women cooking over coals in sampans
Women shining tiffany spoons in glass houses
Women stretching their arms way above the clouds
In Samarkand, in San Francisco
Along the Mekong (more…)

fMhlisa, mfranti and Artemis, have been invited to be on Radioactive, a Salt Lake call in radio show on 90.9fm Wednesday, June 18th from 6-7pm mst.

it is available for download now. (more…)

I haven’t paid much attention to news lately because I’m all gloomy and grievey and stuff, but the few times I’ve caught the pundits talking, it’s about Hillary and the Vice Presidency, and inevitably, they’ve assumed two stupid annoying things:

First, that Barack would not want her to be his running mate, because ? . . . he’s dumb as post? Oh no! Not an extremely capable, very popular running mate, with a huge base of loyal voters attached like money in the bank. NOOooooooOOooooo!

And Second, that she wants to be VP, because, you know, she’s just the type of person who’d sit around and let her bodacious bitch powers rot in boring penultimate executive uselessness₁, when the other choice is being a very popular US Senator from New York wielding legislation and twisting arms the way she was born to. I just don’t see that happening.

Annoying. Have you heard this crap too, or am I just having unlucky encounters with particularly stupid pundits?

So, I guess if reports are to be believed, there are bunches of angry white women out there seething with feminist bitterness that my Hillary lost. While I am, of course, on principle alone, always seething with buckets of feminist bitterness, I’m mostly okay with Barack. (more…)

My dear husband puts a lot of time, effort, thought, and sacrifice into being a good father. And our kids adore him for it. And I adore him for it.

And so it would seem that providing him with a lovely father’s day would be appropriate. I dunno why, maybe all that latent YW programing, but for some reason in the past my idea of giving him a great father’s day has been to perform like the perfect Donna Reed wiffy poo for the day. A spotless house, well-behaved out-of-sight quiet children, a lovingly prepared meal, when he gets home I tuck him into his recliner and offer him a diet coke and the newspaper, all while I look totally hot and cheerfully vacant. He brings home the bacon, I do all the “housework”, I even take out the trash! (shocking but this is not how it usually goes down around here) (more…)

I just finished a delightful book called Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman.  It’s a collection of short essays celebrating the pleasures of reading, and one of these essays is called “The His’er Problem”.   As you can probably tell from its title, the essay discusses gender bias in language.  In this essay, Fadiman gives a nice illustration of how the inclusion of women in words like “mankind” is not necessarily as understood as we’ve been led to believe.

(more…)

So, I just have to say, the cover alone of this book may almost be worth the price of it: (more…)

by CrazyWomanCreek

I’m not Mormon, would never identify as a “housewife,” and only recently made the big step of calling myself a feminist; so how is it that fMh has become my addiction of choice this last year, driving family members to question my sanity and not so subtly asking if I need to see a nice deprogrammer? Well, the surface answer is easy, ya’ll are a bunch of smart, funny feminists tackling important issues in a heartfelt way, what’s not to love?

But under that surface is the truth that I am deeply uncomfortable with a lot of our differences, but what I’ve found is, “uncomfortable” is a good place to be. “Uncomfortable” is where I learn the most. “Uncomfortable” makes me challenge my beliefs, define myself in ways I hadn’t thought of or, that hardest of all, step back and realize I need to change.

(more…)

In one of my recent death posts (you may call me The Blogger-o-Death for the next few months) people suggested that the Victorian tradition of mourning clothing, wearing black or armbands or some marker would be a nice way to declare walking wounded status without having to be so talkly. It does get wearing, things like walking into church or the gym or girl scouts after a month’s absence, and everyone’s like, where’ve you been? Then you have to be all, my dad died, it sucked. The questions and the awkward hugs from people you don’t quite know well enough for that. Seems like an armband might ease some of that, maybe.

I say we bring it back.

Now there’re a lot of Victorian traditions I have no desire to see revived, corsets, and petticoats, and being owned like cattle by my husband and stuff. (good ‘ol days, bah humbug)

However there is one more historical accessory I’ve been planning on reintroducing for a long while now. Parasols. And pasty white skin. I’m a red head, the sun and I do not get along. It has the temerity to beam its searing scorchiness all over my space. It must be stopped. (though I do confess a reluctant fondness for photosynthesis)

So I’ll be getting right on that, mourning bands and parasols coming right up . . . any other useful bits of history I should revive while I’m at it?

New studies show that “gay” means “happy” when it comes to marriage.  Why?  Because same sex couples aren’t bogged down by sexist gender roles.  (more…)

Margaret is 91. Her husband was a war veteran. At the end of World War II they moved from the city to a Soldier Settler farm, which was provided to veterans by the government as a way of thanking them for their service. This is what she told me today:

“I used to work in the city. I wore a hat and gloves to work every day. Then I moved up here to a little shanty without electricity or running water. We lived that way for over a year. It was rough, but we enjoyed it. My mother would say, “Poor Margaret,” she felt so sorry for me living like that. I thought it was good fun. There was no housework.”
(more…)

80 miles is a long way to ride. Yes indeed.

And my lazy self wouldn’t be bothered to ride more than 12 miles a day, a few days a week in preparation for the Little Red Riding Hood Cycling event- and this is NOT the way to properly prepare tender parts for six hours in the saddle. Seriously, it’s like having a stick up your ****** for a really long time. Everything hurts, specifically my legs but dammit! it was worth it- even with the 40 degree temps, crosswinds and rain, the Cache Valley in the spring is a sight to behold. I’m sure a lot of it has to do with silly romantic ideas of snowcapped mountains, rural farmhouses and two lane country roads and yeah… I’m a sucker. (more…)

by Margaret Toscano

In addition to writing about Mormon women and gender issues, I also write about women in the ancient and medieval worlds as part of my academic work at the University of Utah. At the beginning of March, when Artemis asked me if I would write a guest post for Women’s History Month, I told her I was currently working on an article about female desire as depicted on ancient Greek erotic vases. She said that would be a great topic for Feminist Mormon Housewives, so I said I would send something off to her as soon as I sent my classical project to my editor. Well, here it is three months later, and I’m just barely finishing the article on Greek women, though I’m still not sure I have pinpointed female desire on Greek vases. Desire is a slippery subject! “What do women want?” Freud asked. He never really figured it out, and I don’t think I have either, although I’m a woman. I’m not even sure what I want myself, let alone knowing what any other woman wants or feels.

(more…)

A couple of weeks ago on The Bachelorette, DeAnna, the current Queen of the House, had a heart-to-heart discussion with Jesse, the resident long-haired professional snowboarder in a sea of clean-shaven, buttoned-down types. DeAnna wanted to know if Jesse would ever consider leaving his career and his Colorado home (it would be hard to be a pro snowboarder in Atlanta, I guess). Jesse responded by telling her that he couldn’t wait to quit his career and spend his time being a stay-at-home dad.

So that conversation got me thinking… If I were dating a guy who said he wanted to be a stay-at-home dad, would it endear me to him because I could infer from that statement that he’d also be the kind of guy who would support me in my career choices and do his share of the housework? Or would I be annoyed because he’d be claiming something I’d want first dibs on?

(more…)

My father’s was the first time I’ve gone through the funeral experience for someone I was truly close to and loved with all my heart.

I suspected Mormon funerals were as lame as Mormon wedding receptions, but now I know it. It’s like to going to Sacrament meeting. A really nice sacrament meeting, yes–with lovely hymns, some really nice musical numbers, and the best speakers talking about one of my favorite subjects, my dad. A few tears are shed, but there are no unseemly emotional outbursts, no one throws themselves on the coffin or cries out in pain. Lots of stoic and dignified and plenty of solemn. In short, generally emotionally unsatisfying.

I want to wail.

I want to throw my head back and open my throat and cry out until I lose my voice, and I’m just enough of a pagan that I want a bonfire, and drums, and I want to dance wildly until I’m exhausted, emotionally and physically exhausted.

But we Mormons have no publicly sanctioned, socially acceptable ritual for this emotional craving, and I think we should.

As parents we generally do our best to control the types influences that come in contact with our families. I don’t like my kids to watch commercials, I limit the movies they watch, the foods they eat, and the toys they play with.

It’s easy to control things when you have babies and toddlers, but as they get older, control and influences become more complex. The neighbor Hallie has a room full of Bratz dolls. The TV is always on at Max’s house.

So my choices become: banning my children from these houses; letting my children go, but asking them to refrain from Cartoon network with Max and the playing of vapid fashionistas with Hallie; or letting it go.

So far, I’ve gone with letting it go. (more…)

There are enough lawyers and historians here, someone should know the answer.

What happens if a candidate dies during the general election campaign? If the VP has already been selected, does VP just step up as the Presidential candidate and select a new VP? What if no VP has been selected? Is there any historical precedence? Anything on the books? Or would it be a figure-it-out-as-we-go-along type thing?

Please note the views expressed herein are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of FMH or any individual FMH blogger.

I confess.  I’m exhausted with this election, and it hasn’t even started in earnest yet.  That said, I would be neglecting my self-imposed feminist duties if I didn’t spend at least a few minutes reflecting on the 2008 primary election campaigns and the implications for future female candidates.

(more…)

So, how rich are you?