California Feminist Blogs

Years ago when I was an undergraduate at the university, I remember the Jewel album "Pieces of You" came out. At the time I can remember hearing the song "Daddy" for the first time, and it was so liberating because it was one of the first times that I had publicly heard someone give a big "fuck you" to one of their parents. If you read my previous post about my mother, then you know what I'm talking about.

I just found the song on youtube and it has Spanish subtitles:




I love how she calls out her big ole hypocrite dad. Now that I am a little older, I just realized that it reminds me of one of my very favorite poems by the bad ass poet Sylvia Plath. Sylvia Plath pretty much socks it to her dad also. I wonder if this poem influenced Jewel's song:



Purchase the Daddy song by Jewel

On Friday a teacher made an appointment with me and asked if I would sponsor her as her mentor in her college program to get her administrative credential because she wants to be a school principal. I said that of course I would.

During our conversation, she began to cry and stated that she has asked her principal and vice principal if they would give her leadership positions at the school because she wants to develop her leadership capacity. They just blew her off. The principal said that he would support her, but delegated it to a female vice principal.

Apparently it's been months and the vice principal has refused to give her any leadership assignments. This teacher is one of our best teachers, which the principal has told me on numerous occasions and I have witnessed with my very own eyes. Yet the vice principal talks down to her, puts her down, tells her that she doesn't have certain skills to complete an assignment and so on.

Two years ago this same teacher came to me in the same type of situation at another school. When she came into the district I was the one who hired her because I recognized that she is extremely talented. I can't fully explain all of her qualifications because she was actually the first person in the state of California to attain two certain degrees. She has to be about 26 years old or so, yet she has multiple certificates from programs that she has completed, and she also has two masters degrees and is finishing up her school counseling degree and administrative credential.

I just can't explain enough what a kick ass teacher this young lady is.

Five years ago I hired her, and she became the target of a nasty clique of teachers. They harassed her, made fun of her, spread rumors about her, told the principal that she didn't understand things, etc. This almost devastated the teacher because she is very sensitive and a couple of times the teachers made her cry. As a result, they nicknamed her "la llorona" after the mythical woman (Mexican myth) who roamed the countryside at night crying and looking for her children.

The teacher finally made an appointment with me and explained the situation. I was quite aware of the viciousness of these teachers, because I had faced similar attacks by them years ago when I was teaching. One of them is still hot after me, trying to make me look bad as much as she can.

I told the young teacher, "Suck it up and NEVER let them see you cry. They are just jealous of you because they can sense that you have a lot of potential. Don't allow them to tear you down".

You see, at the time she was beginning to believe that there was something wrong with her. However, she sucked it up and carried on.

For a couple of years her principal constantly underestimated her, believing all the rumors about her incompetence. Her principal also didn't include her in leadership positions in the same manner that is happening to her at this moment.

I eventually intervened and worked with the teacher to get her transferred to what we thought would be a better setting. And it was a great setting for the first year-until the bitch vice principal came and started to block the teacher from developing to her full capacity. Now this vice principal is trying to tear her down, put her down and break her self esteem much in the same way that the nasty clique of teachers did to her two years ago.

So we've come full circle again, and on Friday she was sitting in my office crying again. I allowed her to cry and cry and then I said, "I'm just going to be blunt. You better just get used to this crap and in time you will grow thick skin. People are always going to do this to you because you are young, you are a woman, you are a Latina, and you are extremely talented. People will always try to block you from developing to your true potential, will always try to convince you that you can't do something, yet you need to just believe in your own capabilities. If people don't mentor you or give you leadership opportunities, just trust in yourself and keep searching for other people who will. There is always going to be something about you that threatens other people, and they will try to bump you down to their level to make themselves feel better".

I hope that I am not brainwashing this young lady into being cynical or jaded, but it's the only advice that I know how to give. Well, I could tell her how to chop off heads, but I suppose she's not yet ready for that.

I give this advice because it's all I know, having been in the same type of situation as her my entire life. As a teacher I always watched the lame asses and butt kissers get the leadership positions. To this day people try to talk down to me, make me look bad, and sabotage something that I am working on. When I applied for a management position, all the naysayers told me that I was too young. In fact, my boss refused to write a letter of recommendation for me when I applied for this position because of all the rumors that he heard about me. He has since apologized and claims that everyone seriously underestimates my potential to this day.

Years ago, I instinctively felt that I needed to accrue a mountain of degrees, credentials and certificates in much the same way as this young teacher has done. I did this because I had the instinct that a naysayer or jealous person might be sitting on an interview panel if I applied for a job. In my case, this is exactly what happened to me, and my boss later told me that a few people were trying to block me from the position yet I was more qualified than the other candidates.

As a young girl my aunt once told me, "You are a Latina and a girl. You need to make sure that you look better on paper than many other people because if not you will be blocked from many things that you want to do in life. You need to be more qualified than most white men".

I've always carried that thought with me, and it has served me well. I have had to claw my way into positions of leadership that might not have been available if I had not stacked up the credentials on my resume. I have forged ahead when people have told me to not do something because I believe in myself and my abilities. I can only hope that this young teacher sucks it up and continues to believe in herself and excel. I hope that I am not making her jaded and that she will learn how to swim with sharks and not get bitten.

What are your opinions? Has anything like this ever happened to you? What would you have told this young teacher?

Next Question: Does this kind of crap happen to MEN on this type of scale? Male perspectives always welcome! 


Beat Them At Their Game: 
Ambition is Not a Dirty Word: A Woman's Guide to Earning Her Worth and Achieving Her Dream
The Corporate Dominatrix: Six Roles to Play to Get Your Way at Work
The 48 Laws of Power

I feel compelled to make a confession, and I am sure that my brutal honesty just might make someone wiggle or be appalled by what I have to say. But I'll say it anyway because it's just something that I have to do to come to terms with some issues that have been hanging over my head.

I think that I hate my mother. Well, my father too, but that's another case entirely.

I know that this is supposed to be something really taboo to say, right? But I just can't help thinking it every time that I speak with her. The hatred has been growing and building up as each year goes by. I keep waiting for the magical time when I am going to have patience, or forgive her, or all that crap that people tell you will happen when you get older. Yet as I get older I tend to dislike her even more.

I've got such complicated feelings about my mother. Sometimes I admire her for all that she had to overcome in her life because she has survived many tragedies. Sometimes I feel sorry for her, because even though she is not alone, she has managed to alienate herself from everyone around her. On other occasions I try to excuse her behavior, because I really think that she is mentally ill. But most of the time I just hate her guts.

Maybe it's not hate so much as the fact that I wish that she would just disappear and stay the hell out of my life.

I once told a counselor many years ago that I would feel relieved if she were to die, because I wouldn't have to continue to deal with her abusive behavior and her ability to make everyone fucking miserable. I was so ashamed to admit it at the time, but my counselor told me that many people have told her something similar over the years.

I later confessed this to my boyfriend, and he said that I "didn't really feel that way" and that I was just acting out because I was angry. He told me that if she were to pass away that I would feel so guilt ridden that I wouldn't be able to live with myself. He told me that I would always beat myself up for not having spent quality time with her.

I think that the only thing that I will mourn when she is dead and gone is something that I never had-a functional, loving mother.

It's easy for him to tell me that I am just acting out, and that I "don't really mean" what I am saying. Yet he never had a mother who pulled out his hair until his head bled because of something trivial, like not having vacuumed in a straight line. His mother might nag at him, but he can at least sometimes have decent conversations with her that don't always resort to name calling, cursing, criticizing and put downs. Oh, I can go on and on, but why even bother?

All I know is that my life is wonderful when I manage to avoid her for months on end.

My mother left home when she was about fifteen years old and she never talked with her mother again until she was forty years old after her mother had a stroke. She never allowed us to visit her mother and wouldn't talk about her mother at all. All these years I have brainwashed myself that my mother was just repeating what had happened to her and it wasn't her fault. The older that I get, however, and the more that I see that she is able to function like a normal human being at work without smacking the shit out of an employee, I refuse to accept that she has no control over her behavior.

I am able to break convention in so many ways and I never give a shit what anyone thinks about me, but for some strange reason I have not completely been able to break away from her and cut off all contact because I have been so brainwashed by society that I am supposed to forgive her because she is my mother and she sacrificed for me in many ways.

Perhaps me blogging about this taboo subject is a small step that I am making towards just closing up my heart and trying to cut off all contact with her.

I bring this topic up because on Thursday she contacted me and told me that she had a lump in her armpit near the lymph nodes and that she will be having an operation on Monday. Someone else might be upset about this news in regard to their mother, but I felt nothing and carried on with my life. She has been calling me with a worried sound in her voice all weekend and leaving messages (because of course I have been avoiding her).

Due to that nagging little voice in my head that has been imposed on me by society, I thought that it would be respectful to call her tonight and chat with her for a couple of minutes since she will be having surgery tomorrow morning. She does have heart problems after all and being put under anesthesia might cause problems. Within the first five minutes she managed to bitch, moan, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch about anything and everything about me. I finally said, "Ok, bye, have a great fucking surgery" and I hung up. It seems like the past two years all I fucking do is hang up on her after speaking with her for more than five minutes.

I suppose that not much more can really be said about this topic, other than what I've already said. I suddenly feel light and free, as if I am moving towards finally being able to close the door on my relationship with her.

Sometimes I wonder if we, as citizens of the United States, are enlightened, or are we indulged because we have the luxury to ponder the idea of choice while so many of our fellow global citizens do not have the extravagance of such discourse.

This is not to say that choice is a luxury (I believe choice is a human right) but perhaps the ability to exercise it could be classified as so.

Women from higher economic classes will most likely have the ability to access choice even if abortion were to be outlawed. In other words, poor women, even though abortion is legal still many times over do not have the power to exercise their right because disenfranchisement and oppression is their largest obstacle, not the fundamentalist blocking the path to the clinic.

Choice exists with or without the legal right to act on it. But without the faculty to do so what does choice even mean?

Lately, I've been reading a lot about how the job market is benefiting women so well these days. But even with the countless coverage over this amazing "we did it!" moment, I can't help but wonder how the hell I'm supposed to not feel oppressed in the work world. I feel as though the only reason a woman of any ethnicity or stature can climb the proverbial ladder is because she gets paid less.

I'm a college student who has recently come to terms with the fact that I might not be going back to school this semester and thus I am filling out countless applications, making my resume look fabulously formal, and trying to decide if a dress with black tights is suitable for an interview (if I should ever get one). Should I flaunt the fact that I am a women studies major when going into interviews? It seems to turn people off the moment I utter the words.

For instance, at a Christmas dinner party just this past December, I was asked what exactly a women's studies major was and what I was hoping to accomplish. It was difficult to answer in a room with a decent ration of men and to women. I gracefully replied to these questions by saying, "I study feminist theory, women's history, read up on articles and interpret images in our current media and popular culture." I still got blank stares to this answer and I myself didn't even understand what I was saying. What I wanted to really say was that I study how women are so commonly discriminated against and how we are oppressed in our society, but I could feel the detest and dislike for my major from most of the men in the room. My own mother, as much as I love her, seems to not understand why I changed my course from theater arts to women's studies. It's a delicate subject for people to recognize. It's like when a person of color brings up our nation's history of racism and slavery; it makes for an awkward atmosphere.

So even with women's oppression on my brain at all times, should I mention my passion for women's studies and how I want to become successful by breaking glass ceilings that I thought I never could? Or is this too much for an employer to understand? Two things I've found taboo to talk about in our society: oppression (racism, sexism, and most 'isms) and sex (although we flaunt it at every chance we get). Both subjects are ones that I have worked with intensely this past semester and I have put on my applications and resume. It's awfully hard to not discuss these two large concepts when they affect me so much.

Another thought and my final one for this post; maybe instead of just fretting about how I'm going to make these subjects sugar-coated enough for the average person to handle, I should flaunt it modestly and show how its made me into a more confident person. After all, confidence is the best make-up one can wear to an interview these days and especially with the economy in the toilet still.

This Friday makes the 37th anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

That's all I have to say! May we continue to have reproductive rights over our body for years to come.

xoxoxo

Sometimes being a manager or leader sucks. Many of us come up through the ranks and along the way we find people who we work very well with. Before we are in positions of power, we might collaborate with people who hold a similar philosophical perspective. In fact, many of us work so well with certain people that we begin to see them as part of our team. There's nothing really wrong with that, but it might become a problem when one of the team becomes a manager.

I've had two colleagues who over the years I have grown to view as my partners. We all taught together in the same schools, became academic coaches and co-trainers together, and had each other's back when the going was tough. We stood together when we protested something that we were in disagreement with. We got our masters degree together, studied together, and mentored one another. Every step of the way in my career they have always been there.

When I became a manager over two and a half years ago, I was dragged through the mud and had to fight an uphill battle against numerous co-workers, including some people who had previously been my mentors and colleagues. My two partners, however, cheered me on throughout the assassinations on my character and deliberate acts committed by others in order to derail any progress that I was making. When one of my employees stripped the computers and files of all important documents, powerpoints, etc before she went out on an extended sick leave, my three partners helped me "save face" by coming in to work on a Saturday in order to try to salvage what had been erased. They spent hours and hours of their free time by helping me recreate the documents when they could not be recovered.

The other day I told my boyfriend, "You really know who your friends are when you become successful".

He said, "No, it's the opposite. You really know who your friends are when they stick by you when you are down and out. Everybody wants to become your friend and kiss your ass when you are successful".

I see his point, but I think that mine is equally as valid. Sure, it's a true test of friendship when people stand by you when the going gets tough, but it is also takes a secure friend to stand by you when you achieve success because many people are jealous and try to tear you down when you achieve success. If a friend stands by you when you are down and out, as well as when you are at the height of success-that's the mark of a loyal friendship.

As leaders we are often told that we need to get the "right people on the bus" and make sure that we have people on our team who are consistent with our goals and objectives. So it makes sense that as a new manager I would logically hire two of my previous partners as my employees when they applied for the job.

I didn't hire them because of my friendship with me. I don't necessarily consider them to be friends in the conventional sense of the word, because our relationship was more based on being colleagues than anything personal. I hired them because at the time they were honestly the only two people who understood my goals and vision and would be able to carry it out. They were far more qualified than anyone who applied for the job.

Over the past two and a half years, everything has been going well. They have handled it quite well that while I was once their equal, I am now their boss. I can't say the same for my previous employee who stripped me of all the necessary information-we used to be equals and she could not handle that I was suddenly her superior. My two partners (and now employees) have always showed respect for my position and have never expected any special treatment or favors. This is why I value them so much.

But now I have a dilemma and I don't know how to deal with it.

About a year ago, one of my employees had a baby. I knew as soon as she came back that she was suffering from postpartum depression and urged her to get help, but she refused to listen. Six months ago she finally went on medication, but it seems that she is getting progressively worse and spiraling out of control.

Over the past couple of months, she has continuously called in sick, arrives late at work, doesn't finish assignments, and loses her temper with other employees. She has started to fight with my other male employee, putting him down and raising her voice at him in front of other people and his subordinates.

I have talked with her a couple of times about her behavior and she has cried and said that she is trying to get better. I have listened to her and tried to work around her schedule because she has made comments that maybe she should just go back to the classroom and teach again because she can't handle the stress of the job.

Over the years she has stood beside me as we have climbed the ladder and tried to smash the glass ceiling to pieces. She has taken bullets from some of my political enemies, being targeted by a few people only because she was my partner and they had issues with me. She has worked overtime to make me look good, and move forward the agenda that the three of us have together.

Maybe I have been to soft on her by trying to accommodate her schedule and work around her family issues. Maybe I have made excuses for her for a bit too long. My male boss tells me that I need to call her in, lay down the law, and write her up. But it's hard to take his advice seriously, because he is a male manager. As a female I just can't get the idea out of my mind that she is suffering from depression and having a hard time with having a second child.

Today she didn't come in to work and didn't contact me until 3:30 p.m. to tell me that her son was sick. No one noticed that she was out and had just assumed that she was out and about somewhere. Yet the writing is clearly on the wall that she is starting to lose control of herself.

I know now that I need to call her in and have a serious discussion with her. I just don't know what to say that hasn't already been said. What do you say to someone with depression? What do you say to someone who feels that they can't handle their second child and are not getting any help from their husband?

All I know is that her problems are now starting to affect other people and their job performance, including myself. So this is where I have to draw the line.

Today I found an interesting documentary on the biography channel about "Calamity Jane", wild woman legend of the west. All I have to say is that the documentary was so very, very delightful.

Calamity Jane earned the reputation for out-smoking, out-drinking and out-shooting any man at the time in the west. Sounds like my kind of lady! Biographers have a hard time sorting out the truth versus the myth of who really Calamity Jane was because so many over-exaggerated myths swirl around her. Was she really dangerous? Was she a prostitute? Was she a wild alcoholic? Was she a mean, wild, crazy bitch? Who was she really??

I have actually never even heard of Calamity Jane until today. I don't have much experience with the "wild west" days and honestly it hasn't really interested me much. Apparently Calamity Jane is a character in the "Deadwood" HBO special, which I have never seen, but I sure might be watching now!

You can find the biography by clicking here. You will need to click on "historical figures" and her biography will be located there. I had some issues while watching the video, because the media player would often not open, but I just exited out of my browser and reopened it again. The video is broken into several sections and will automatically switch to the next section when done with one section. If the video freezes while switching from one part to the next, just click on the video and it should go to the next section. There were a few technical issues, but I think it was definitely worth it.

Believe me, I'll be revisiting the myth of Calamity Jane at another time, as soon as I find out more information on her!

I don't know how long the video will be up on the biography channel website, but if you are interested in purchasing your own video of Calamity Jane's biography, you can purchase it by clicking here.
calamity jane, myth of calamity jane, wild women of the west, calamity jane

A couple of days ago, I wrote a post about anonymous blogging, and I stated that I have yet to have quite put my finger on why I choose to blog anonymously. I suggested that it might have something to do with the fact that I like to play with reality and illusions. But today I actually remembered why I choose to remain unknown.

It's not that I am ashamed of anything I say, because I love everything about me. I'll admit that years ago when I first started my career I might have slightly had that "but what will they think" type of attitude going on, but I quickly outgrew that. It would be accurate to say that around the time I hit about 27 years old, I just stopped caring so much what anyone might say about me. And as the years go by I care even less and less.

So lately I have been questioning why I blog anonymously and am a bit elusive with my identity. Well, today I remembered.

To make a long story short, I work my ass off. I go above and beyond and this includes attending my workers' weddings, community functions, and answering my telephone after hours to put out fires or answer peoples' questions. My job is very intensive with the aspect of community service. It's not that I hate it, but sometimes I get so damn sick of my work life intruding on my personal life and I just want to draw a strict boundary between the two.

I created a facebook page and I only added a few of my close friends. I thought that I made my settings completely private, but somehow I began to get invites from some of my employees, co-workers, employees of friends and so on. I tried to just ignore their requests, but some people actually even asked me when they saw me why I hadn't added them. So I added them.

I'm a big Bitch with a capital B, but with work it is different.  am a fierce bitch and will stick it to whoever I have to, but I try not to at work. It's my job to make the school system a better place, and that includes convincing teachers, principals, parents, employees, community members and everyone else to work together to achieve common goals and maybe do something that they might not want to do. I can't just go give a big "fuck you" to everyone because then ultimately it hurts the kids because people aren't doing what they are supposed to.

One day I wrote on my facebook wall that I didn't like a Law and Order episode when the abortion doctor was killed because it seemed like it put a negative slant on the doctor. One of my employees got on there and said, "I loved it!" I said, "Well, I didn't because I am pro-choice". She said, "I am pro-life!!!!!!" I just finished the conversation because I knew that it would be a bit difficult to get her future buy-in at work if I have her a beat down.

Now every time I look at this girl, I can't get the idea out of my mind that she is a right wing asshole. I wish I would have never known anything personal about her.

After that episode, I went on facebook and I stated that I was going to go off facebook. I thought that I could unfriend some of the facebook people and just block them. Well, a few of them noticed that I was still on there because they saw that I was writing on someone's wall that they were friends with. They mentioned that I must have unfriended them by accident and I ended up adding them back. Uh.

Today I went onto facebook and one of my close friends was debating on her page over a video that she had posted about Russell Simmons and meditation. One of her old secretaries was criticizing her for discussing meditation, and was telling her that it was from the devil. My friend sent me an instant message and said, "Can you believe this shit?" I wanted to bitch slap that lady too, but she works with our department and I don't really want to make my life miserable by pissing off an important secretary, so I decided that I would just keep my mouth shut.

At that exact moment, I realized why I blog and tweet anonymously.

I have to be around work people all day long, and frankly I don't really care for any of them to be close to me in my personal life. I have to bite my tongue many times during the day and work with people who I don't really care for, so why the hell do I want to come home from work and chat about it with them. Furthermore, they honestly don't need to know the authentic "me" because it's none of their damn business. I want them to know nothing about who I really am, and I want the relationship to only stay in the work place.

I am with these people all the time, and when I come home I just want to play on the internet only with very close friends as well as people who I have come to know online who have similar interests as mine. It's like a time-out for me. If I were to post my real name, I can just imagine all these work people finding me and wanting to talk to me. I need a little damn peace and time away from them!

So I created a separate facebook account that I can use, which no one knows about except very, very close friends as well as twitter and blog friends. Of course it's under a pseudonym, but I've got to do what I've go to do, ya know? I swear, even when I made myself private they somehow hunted me down and found me.

I just need a little peace. And I need to trash my other facebook profile and kiss those people goodbye.