My Body...

"has been holding its ground during my own personal civil war for the past 5 years"


((ever read the vagina monologues? one section starts the phrase "my vagina" (or something like that) and girls fill in the blanks with their own sentiments. i wanna do something more girl AND boy friendly, and i want to see what different people have to say.

what does a feminist think about her body?

please put yr first name or an alias down? i'm asking to put some answers in a book i'm writing and i want to keep privacy but give credit)) This is an exact quote from a feminist message board I put up about a month ago. Over the weeks I've gotten some pretty good answers from various feminists, and I'm still dying to hear more. Dying for it, seriously.


stylee
« Reply #1 on Mar 7, 2007, 1:47am »
My body... is an adventure. The ebb and flow of weight gain, weight loss, feeling good, feeling bad, looking good, looking bad, and so on gives me new surprises everyday. I like my body. I don't see a reason not to like it because it is me. The most important thing for me is feeling good. I don't care (necessarily) how I actually look. I want to feel beautiful and project genuine beauty into the universe.


Chez
« Reply #2 on Mar 7, 2007, 11:34pm »
...is sometimes foreign to me. I always laugh at how absurd the idea of something so abstract such as my mind, thoughts, feelings etc. fitting into something so physical and it feels like my body keeps them all together like a grocery sac.


Punched By Lady Luck
« Reply #3 on Mar 10, 2007, 3:27pm »
...is getting used to the idea that it's not getting any younger; it's reminding me that exercise and diet are not polite suggestions. I can feel the difference in every step.


elona
« Reply #4 on Mar 10, 2007, 4:44pm »
...is wonderful and terrible, a source of pleasure and pain. Some days I love it, other days I hate it, and sometimes I'm neutral about it. It is always here with me (except when I dream), but it is constantly changing, shifting slightly, and I'm still getting to know it. I should take better care of my body than I do, but it makes it hard for me because it rebels.

Dee
" MY BODY IS MY CANVAS. THE INK THAT IS UNDER MY SKIN, THE METAL THAT GOES THROUGH IT, AND THE CLOTHES I PUT ON IT ALL REPERSENT WHO I AM, WHERE I HAVE BEEN, AND WHERE I AM GOING. EVERY SCAR TELLS A STORY. I REFUSE TO HIDE MY CURVES, I REFUSE TO BE LESS SEXUAL OR LESS ANYTHING BECAUSE MY BODY ISNT THE NORM. I LOVE THAT I COULD NEVER FIT INTO A MOLD. MY BODY LETS ME SHOW THE WORLD WHO I AM. LOUD, ABBRASIVE, AND SOMEHOW ANTI-EVERYTHING AND PRO-EVERYTHING. THERE IS NOT ONE SINGLE THING THAT DEFINES ME. MY BODY IS MY CANVAS AND WHEN I DIE I HOPE IT SHOWS WHAT A LONG STRANGE TRIP THIS HAS BEEN

acidstars
« Reply #7 on Mar 16, 2007, 5:26pm »
..scares me. My brain scares me sometimes. I think of some really awful things and wonder how the hell my mind managed to conjure up that kind of stuff. Everything about my body is scary. its so fragile. I terrify myself by thinking about being in a horrible accident and being copmpletely paralysed and having my brain turn to liquid. The body conveys what we think, we communicate with it; we speak, dance, laugh, smile, cry, and its important for me, to be always talking and thinking and dreaming and using it in some way..so the idea of it breaking down and becoming an immobile bag of organs that can't do anything is my worst nightmare.

piratesmile21
« Reply #8 on Mar 17, 2007, 11:25am »
is a lion on my best days and a mouse on my worst.

b
« Reply #9 on Mar 18, 2007, 6:50pm »
...is the one thing in my life that I will always be able to call my own and nobody can take that away from me.

lezbianthezbian
« Reply #10 on Mar 20, 2007, 10:37pm »
....does not look the way society says it should. This taught me to question what society tells me. About my body, about what it is to be a woman, to be female, to be androgynous. It taught me to reject the eating disorders I could have fallen into, the makeup I was told to wear, and the heels I can't balance in. My body is my own, not a carbon copy of anyone else's ideal.


hollylalaith
« Reply #12 on Mar 20, 2007, 11:16pm »
...Is a site of many things, it is my own and nobody else's. It is a place of confusion and contradiction, but is slowly beginning to make sense. It is a place that has recently experienced many new situations, both good and bad, but more importantly, situations that make me who I am. It is a place where decisions are made about who I am, what I do, what I believe in and where I am going. It is a place that has recorded every little thing I have seen, heard, experienced and felt and has created my identity, whatever that may be or end up.

Suzy
« Reply #13 on Mar 21, 2007, 7:36am »
... is so really strange. I've just started liking it for a bit, after gaining a lot of weight. I'm still a little bit scared of it, because I always learnt that bodies are sinful and that we should be ashamed to have one. You won't see me in a bikini in the near future, but at least I'm no longer afraid of mirrors. And really, I'm starting to like the person in the mirror

Debasser
...is whatever I make it. Weak, strong, an instrument, a tool, a fantasy, made up, dressed up, dressed down... full of guts!

squiggle
...is never the same two days in a row. bad one day, and great the next. it has a mind of its own. i can do whatever i want (eat lots to gain weight, exercise to lose weight) without any effects. i cant control my stomach pudge, but i can control the way i feel about it, which i try to do every day.

varlagrrrl
« Reply #17 on Mar 27, 2007, 4:05pm »
....is a struggle

arienette
« Reply #22 on April 14, 2007 10:32am »
...is my enemy. I fight myself for no good reason; a switch in my head clicks for the worst and some days I no longer want to live. I want everything to end...until it clicks again and I am at the opposite extreme.





((I would love to hear more, now))

© 2007 Lucia Doyle