At the crossroads

I'm at the Feminism 2.0 conference, doing some liveblogging.

At the crossroads: Organizing the next generation of feminists online and off is excellent.

@HumanFolly - Jen Nedeau

@nerdette - Tanya Tarr

@csamuels - Cynthia Samuels

Tanya - The Women's Conundrum - strengths of a community not leveraging its potential

Power bases - power as women voters in the elecorate and our power as consumers - because we exist here and are the majority here.

Women voters have exceeded men since 1964.

266 women have served in FEderal govt as elected officials - 37 are WOC, 31 have been governors. Impatient for future when percentage of population is represented in the government. We represent a majority but we're not there yet.

Consumer power - women make up 80 percent of consumer choices in the country. Quoted frequently. It's a true thing. Buying homes - women are part of that. Entire marketing divisions at P&G, Kraft, J&J devote millions of dollars to tracking women's consumer decisions. TREMORS? (MIdwestern moms?)

Enormous potential if we can find common ground. 3 of 4 women in Emily's list poll state that sexism remains a problem in the U.S. Talk about -isms and prejudices but distinction not made that everyone walks around w/ prejudices but isms are structural, keep people from jobs and equality.

@csamuels Boomers are tribal. Anything that brings us together on or offline is comfortable. We're completely available emotionally for it.

Why women get the Web - think about what the assets are int he Web for women. Trying to figure out how to reach women, make the most of them.

Web is so inclusive and hospitable to women. Community building is something women do organically, a carpool or a spa for someone's bday. Web gives us tools to do that. I really think we have to remember, women have been doing this since the birthing tent, the quilting bee, not something we figured out when a computer hit our desks. 

Thinks people love BlogHer so much because it's become a tribe. Allowed me to find people who are much more comfortable for me.

KIm Gandy and Eleanor Smeal are us.

She started on iVillage when it was sites started by women with 12-step experience. She knew how to put meetings together.

Bifurcation between older and younger women re: feminism that doesn't have to exist.YOunger women will not allow feminism to die.

At BlogHer, person said problem was "old feminists." She went home and consulted with colleague on how to bring younger women in, seek inclusion.

We should be looking for each other. Someone said "how can I write about family issues, I don't have any kids." She had been made to feel that just because she was not herself a parent, she didn't have a right to have policy or philosophical views that were worth blogging about. It's unnecessary.

Jen+ For the younger generation feminism is like fluoride, we scarcely know we ahve it, it's simply in the water (quote from Manifesta.)

Friends don't consider themselves feminists although they benefit from and hold the values.

Feminist2.0 is like self-fulfilling prophecy of the Web. Two-way conversaion, input and output, ability to opt in and opt out.

Younger people able to opt in and out of feminism.

How do we unify with existing divisions?
Young women are not the same species you had 20/40 years ago.

Younger women might not take "ladder" approach, might take lateral moves...Twitter, etc. Don't believe in pyramid. Internet is inherently democratic place. Levels distinctions of social status.She started on Twitter a year ago - amazing that she can tweet at Ellie Smeal and she will respond.

Tanya - is going to video questions.

Questions: Idea of social media. Alot of women talk about feminism/womanism but don't know what a blog is. When she told 70 year-old aunt she had a blog, she didn't know what that was. How do we bring people into our sphere.

Cindy - This is an online and offline opportunity. We can reach people on and get to them off and vice versa. People can go into senior centers and teach them how to use computers. For most people of a certain age, as soon as they have grandchildren they want to be online. Want to use webcams. Homey answers but the first thing that sounded like they might be productive.

Jen - Making Web more female-friendly - default avatar the shape of a woman rather than a man on every social network would be nice, for example

Cindy - Wouldn't expect everyone to have a FB page.

Lulu -Women are stretched for time and resources? How do we get around this to get them to use the tools?

Tanya - Woman took her Flip video camera everywhere she went. Video clip about how she figured out how to jimmy her camera to dashboard witha  hair clip. She was so excited. Wonderful thing about mothers, is that we're amazing engineers. Have to make it all fit and manage our time. Question comes up alot - we all want to blog, make time for it in our life, but we have to find ways to jam it into our life.

Great thing about Twitter, it's constant, mobile, I do it all the time. Carving out those tiny moments as we're walking to the next thing.

Question: Who are not considered feminist but are important swing voters? 

Jen - Unmarried bloc is huge

Tanya - We don't have any form of even loose unification among all women voters.Coalition-building, have to get men involved. There are men in this audience, thank you for coming.

Cindy - How do you get these people into the tent? We have to think outside of litmus tests - there's one box they check, reach them on that, they don't have to believe in things they don't believe in.

We have purist definitions and all it does is shut people out.

Tanya - Saw various "(blank) for OBama" - everyone can throw up what they want to help define their participation in the campaign. "Scientists for Obama," "Armenian-Americans for Obama," "Mac-Users for Obama." Want to create something like that for feminist movement.

If we want to coalesce as the next 3rd wave, going to have people with a range of values but join together on a few of the important ones.

Alice Cohan - Political Director of Feminist Majority - Difference between bldg feminist movement and bldg communications network. 

There are issues that are inherent to what a feminist is - reproductive rights and justice is one of them. If we soften that position for the good of reaching out, we may have more numbers, but we will turn around and not have a movement. We need to be clear and firm and srong on what issues make up feminism. Reach out to sisters and welcome and join them on those issues.

Sarah Palin is not a feminist. She is a political user.

It's important to be clear that we have goals that we need to achieve as a movement. 2.0 are tools - not the end result. 

There are groups taht are single-issue, working on particular things. If we''re working on equal pay we wouldn't

But to define yourself as a member of the movement, it's important for people to know what that means, what we stand for.

Jen - it's a matter of telling the feminist story. Bring them into the narrative, show them their place in it.

Question - We are women who want to pass something along. We have our stories. We don't necessarily want to sit in front of the computer and blog. Like idea of someone blogging our stories for us. Want to get the word out. She appreciates knowing about the blogging.

Tanya - Cross-generational collaboration was successful- can work in Asian cultures, blogging, language barriers and taboo topics. Told a story of cancer in a family that was difficult to talk about.

Podcasting and videoblogging, a lot less typing. 

New Moon Media - magazine for girls 8-12 are complete feminists; much more focused on what is equal and fair than teens are. Young girls still very connected to idea that world should treat them fairly. Fascinated by stuff online, new media. Ten year old niece wanted her own Flip Video so she could start making her own films. Huge amount of energy there. Helps girls to bridge that time from girlhood to time in college when many young women have traditionally discovered feminism. Don't ahve to have that disconnect in between. 

Man in orange, first day of fellowship at AAUW. Grew up in Chicago, didn't talk about feminism in his neighborhood. As an AFrican-American man, how should he talk to his male friends who are mystified by feminism. How to bridge that gap? His grandma was his feminist role model.

Lauren blogs at Change.org - wrote about OBama, embracing feminism, re: Ms. Magazine covers.

She put her blog on gtalk status, guy friend wanted to talk about it. She explained fem2.0 conference. He rolled his eyes and said, "Ugh, feminism, I don't want to hear about that." You have to make it a teachable moment. Black people aren't a monolith and feminists aren't either. I wear heels and don't mind door being opened for me. But I believe in equality and reproductive choice. Need to be more men of color who are embracing feminism. Men of color in particular are misogynists and sexist without knowing it. Need to let them know it makes them no less of a man to be committed to equality.

Jen - Feminism allowed women to redefine themselves in such a way that men do not have idea of how to redefine themselves.

Source of lists of feminist blogs? PunditMom, Momocrats, BlogHer.

Carolyn Cook - distressing to me that progressives/democrats ahve assumed position that it's our way or the highway. Voted for Sarah Palin.

Comments

[Nerdette]

OMG! Laurie!! thanks for liveblogging this!!! ((hug)) and thanks for coming to the panel! what a great conference!

[Nerdette]

I finally posted the video highlights!

Thanks again for this liveblog, so gracious of you!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGhorkLoZyw