In defence of Valentine's Day

By Ross Parry

It’s the 13^th of February and that means the floodgates of soppy gifts and declarations of love are about to blow open for that annual mush-fest: Valentine’s Day.

Now I can’t say I’m a particular lover of the day of romance but I’m not a hater either. I just see it as a nice excuse for people to consider how wonderful our bonds with other people (or Game of Thrones box sets) can be. However, there are a seemingly endless group of people who take such a dislike to Valentine’s Day that they just can’t keep it from the world.

Single at Christmas

 By Jo Paterson

So it’s Christmas; schools have broken up for the holidays, town centres are crammed full with shoppers and festooned with lights, Christmas songs dominate radio playlists and you can’t watch anything on tv without being reminded of what the season is supposed to be about (ie. food, presents, family, love and celebrating the perfectness of life)... This isn’t a scroogey Christmas blog where I’m about to say how much I hate all these things because actually, I love them. I love Christmas. 

But what gets me is that according to the world, I’m supposed to be coupled up, receiving something expensive from my gorgeous loving boyfriend, spending Saturdays hand in hand with him in town and cold winter nights cuddling up with him on the sofa. What is it about Christmas that fills us with dread at the prospect of being alone? Christmas is all about being together, the media tell us, and I know that that is about family and friends and community. But we’re also pummelled with the idea that our Christmas isn’t perfect without an adoring other half to complete us. 

I dream of self-esteem

By Nicki Fudge

Shall we be honest with ourselves for a second? We have ALL struggled from low self esteem about the way that we look. Some of us hide it behind layers of makeup, extensive wardrobes and multiple hair products. Others take the opposite route, and develop a spiky attitude that screams ‘I REALLY don’t care what you think of my appearance’, whilst hiding their body and their face behind baggy clothes and deliberate lack of effort.

So here are three ways in which I tackled my own total hatred of my physical appearance which, although it hasn't completely gone away (I still get a few days every month where I can’t stand how I look),  has now changed from something that regularly used to dominate my thoughts, to feeling laughably irrelevant to my general life.

I’m dressing as a sexy devil for Halloween and the patriarchy has nothing to do with it

By Elly Murrell

George Berry has already done a fantastic response to Flo’sarticle which you should read here. The kind with metaphors I can only dream to conjure up. With the male side of the argument covered I’d like to throw in my two cents.

Why girls shouldn't dress in sexy costumes for Halloween: an exercise in positive discrimination.

By George Berry

So you’ve read Flo’s article about the trend of women dressing revealingly for Halloween, and why doing so is putting back their gender a century, and if you haven’t then stop reading here and follow this link to do so here.

I feel like the word “patriarchy” is used to basically whitewash a subject with a buzzword. It’s true that men expect certain things of women that we probably shouldn’t, such as being in good shape with an obvious care to your hygiene and physical appearance, but isn’t that exactly what you’d expect in a man (or mate of the same gender)? A lot of issues can be put both ways, the status quo not only perpetuates the trend of racy costumes but also puts pressure on men in similar ways.

Happy Halloween

By Florence Celia May

From Flo's World

So I've spoken about fancy dress on here before, but it's Halloween time again, and I just want to get all this angst I have off my chest.

Why catcalling is not a compliment

By Joy McManus

Catcalling is defined by Urban Dictionary, a relevant source in this case, as:

‘When a guy gives the wert whirl whistle or yells at a babydoll for the purpose of getting attention and in hopes of a future hook up… 99.9% [of the time] a hookup never arises and it’s just the thrill that keeps these going’

Sometimes if a girl gets catcalled and then communicates that she didn’t appreciate it the response can often be ‘take it as a compliment’, which I don’t understand. How is it meant to be a compliment if a passing stranger thinks they have the right to comment on your body or how much they’d like to have sex with you? The fact that we need to justify why catcalling is wrong saddens me- surely not being shouted at and harassed as we go about our daily lives should be a human right.

Mean girls: the culture of bitching

By Nicki Fudge

“Nobody ever talks about the mean things that girls do to each other”

Bitchiness is endemic but, as this quote (from the author of the book that the film ‘Mean Girls’ is based upon) states, it is rarely spoken about. ‘Mean Girls’ is a hilarious film, and one of its main attractions for me is its highly accurate depiction of the way some women behave towards each other: the culture of bitching.

The Glasses Ceiling

By Bethan Gormley

There is a distinct lack of famous women in the music industry who openly and actively wear glasses, which is an issue that I have been noticing for a few years now. The music industry is one of the few sectors in which female presence almost equals its male counterpart; the glass-ceiling has been smashed, it would seem. But the glasses-ceiling? Not so smashed.

Male and female brains

By Madeleine Whybrow 

The idea that men and women are inherently different, particularly in psychological terms, is a popular, perhaps even obvious, view. Common sense tells us that behaviour depends heavily on gender; men are often more aggressive and prone to risk-taking, whereas women tend to be kinder and more communicative. Could it be that these differences are hard-wired into our brains?

Girls who eat their feelings.

No one likes to be dumped. And this goes for all forms of rejection, whether by a man, job interview or friend.

 Rejection makes us feel unwanted, unattractive, unhappy. The list goes on…

 So we reach for that tub of the ice cream. We eat our feelings. We compare ourselves to Bridget Jones with that tub of Ben & Jerry’s. One last feast, and then tomorrow, we’ll turn our lives around, we’ll show them.

 This is a disastrous coping mechanism.

The Thigh Gap

The glorification of diet fads such as the Dukan, “No Carbs before Marbs” and Samantha Brick’s latest contribution to the world of journalism, the “polo diet”, has convinced women of all ages and sizes that life just isn’t worth living if the gap between your thighs is less than three inches.  British women these days are 5’6 on average and weigh in around 10st 3lbs, giving them a BMI of 23 and placing them in the upper-half of the ‘healthy’ scale.  Sure, you could lose 6 BMI points and still hover around the healthy mark, but why can’t we be happy in our own skin?

Feminists Shave Their Legs Too

Recently I've been thinking a lot about where I fit into society, what is my identity? Ticked boxes on a questionnaire might describe me as "white British", "18-25", "female", "graduate", "single", "employed", "Christian". All labels, and none that make me unique, but that mean I belong to a certain category of the population. The last year of emerging from the student bubble into the world of work has made me think more about my role in society, and especially as a young woman. What does it mean to be a 20 something girl in Britain right now?