Center for New Words; WGBH Forum Network; Feminist Blogging: From Journalism to Activism

Our session is titled Tumnus blogging from activism. I believe it is the full title is not on the page from activism to journalism. In election years and beyond. Or maybe it was from journalism to activism and election years of journalism activism journalism activism and blogging that we're talking about today. And I have the. Great privilege of. Moderating this panel with Veronica Arriola. Who is. A woman of many many issues. I don't know if even jack of all trades covers it. She runs women in science engineering program at you I see she is a founding board member of the organization that I run women in media and news. And she is a mommy blogger and blogger in many different spheres and increasingly is published in journalistic spheres as well. And Cynthia who do you want to say what your blog a name. Is it OK for me to say that your blog is anonymously as cinematic with Mama cracks which was an incredibly astute political

mothers blog. During the election and is also in her day to day life which is why the anonymity of filmmaker documentarian. And I will say I will let them introduce themselves in more depth in a moment. Originally I will say I will apologize. One of our session presenters Kim Pearson who's a professor of journalism. And a blogger who blogs not only as a citizen journalist but as a journalist does a blog with a journalistic ethic was supposed to be here. There are some problems with housing and funding in schools budget cuts and et cetera. So Kim won't be joining us today but you can find her at her. Her name is Professor Kim. I don't remember the exact link but you can find her online if you google pre-cancer Kim and Lochend she blogs a lot about race and gender and journalism. So today we want to talk about the fact that.

2008 2007 2008 was an incredibly rich time a challenging time a. Sort of a brilliant and exciting time but also sometimes a very painful time to be a blogger who blogs specifically about gender and race. There were so many opportunities in the election year new cycle primaries up until post election to introduce discussions that don't generally filter into corporate debate. A corporate media debate I should say but some of those discussions when they filtered in were incredibly damaging in the frames. And there were also a lot of other issues not just presidential election related from Proposition 8 and the pitting of queer communities and African-American communities against one another in corporate media and then filtering into the blogosphere to dissension and discussion and debate among women of color bloggers and feminist white feminist bloggers to the shifting

role of mommy bloggers and what. What is relevant and what isn't what's appropriate and what isn't in the political sphere at mommy blogging sphere. There were so many challenges and we're going to talk a lot about that today. I want to start I just realized I didn't introduce myself now. My name is Jennifer Posner. I'm the founder and direct executive director of women in media and news. We have a group blog called women's voices. I am men women's voices. And you can get to our blog at. I am an online dot org. That's our Web site you could click over from our Web site too. The longer you are at the. Old school yay chalk. And our group focuses on representations of women in media as well as the state of media. So structural reform issues media activism media justice and we have several dozen women who are house bloggers who blog about different aspects of women and the media. And we also accept guest blog

posts on ASH and the issues related to media. So feel free to pitch us in any case. Let us start this conversation off. By. Going into your introduction first. OK. OK. You guys can introduce yourself more deeply and then we'll start up the conversation about the election. Hi everybody. Hopefully we'll keep this lively. We won't go into lunch coma. Coma. I'm writing a Vladika Arriola. I've been blogging since about late 2008 right after the election. It was quite inspirational to get some things off my chest. My current blog Viva la feminist has been I've been writing that since summer of 2007. I my first blog was very much more personal as I said it came out of the election so it's much more about God damn. Can't believe this is happening. The Supreme Court and you know Al Gore and Paul dine. It just was very much like ranty kind of odd. So I.

Them. So then after I blog through my pregnancy and the first couple of years of my daughter in a very traditional I think mom blogging kind of way. But then I started to enter into more public writing. So I kind of rebranded myself as a blogger with V-Vocal feminist. And one of the reasons I did that was because I and. I've been an active member of our of the feminist community for a long time. Activists been with now Planned Parenthood and all sorts of other organizations and through those years I spent even before I became a mom I was trying to infuse feminist activism with mom issues mothering issues not so much trying to expand the conversation of choice to go beyond birth control and abortion to include birthing issues in hospitals and midwives and all those sorts of things.

Adoption. Just a hard conversation to have a family circle. We haven't tried it. That's that you know you won't lose time with that one. But I'm. So when I was moving towards a more public but blogging and entering the kind of the bigger mom blogosphere I decided that my reason for that was to infuse politics into the mom blogosphere because it was very traditional stereotypical you know oh you know they rolled over today what kind of difficulties and you know Bob I mean. All those things that are very good and great for building community but I wanting it to be more of what I wanted to do more with it. So that's why my blog is actually about the intersection of feminism and motherhood and what happens when those two things collide. What happens to a feminist activist when she has baby. So in with both of those things trying to infuse politics into Mom conversations and mom stuff into feminist conversations

is also trying to also keep an eye on the lens of being a Latina or a woman of color and with those things how those things. Have been a woman of color changes that conversation or where we go with that. And. So. That's kind of me in a nutshell very much. Hi. I blog is cinematic. And my you know names obviously on my name tag but if you're live tweeting or live blogging if you would be to me cinematic that we'd like you to keep that. And the reason is that I'm working on the documentary. It's not anything earthshaking It's just that I've invested a lot of time in it and the people who are the subjects of the documentary Some of them are very. Politically conservative and very different politics than mine. And I've been so vocal that I'm a little worried about my word worlds crossing and I would hate for my documentary suppressed all of. The things. Their consent. So that's why I'm a little weird about like sort of.

The. Privacy issues but. Look like Veronica I was sort of born as a blogger and a blogging journalist when I became a mother. I just started blogging in 2003 you know got pregnant in February of 2003 and had my my only child in November just as it was paralleling you know the run up to the Iraq war and so I just kept my blog then which was completely private was one part Kath's one hard pregnancy and one part of. George Bush you know just ranting and you know pregnancy hormones going so extra Manstein pregnant at the same time you know. Exactly. I was more estrogen. So I really didn't kind didn't think of myself as a political blogger. And you know. The birth February of 2007 I think it was.

2008. I'm sorry. And Gloria Steinem I think had come out recently with her piece on you know if you were a woman and a feminist then these are reasons why you should support Hillary Clinton and I immediately dashed off something that entitled feminists for Obama. And so I'm just going to kind of come out right now and you know say that that's what side of the fence I fell on. But. You know as with a lot of blogging I just thought it was a very lengthy blog new pictures. You know lots and lots of text. Who the heck is reading even. And lo and behold some women who had started up a group blog called Mama cats obviously to. It. Finding a place for progressive and liberal women on line whether or not they were parents to be able to make a community and also you know get information on that particular sort of slant.

And and also help you know locally as well as nationally elect more Democrats. So we were very partisan from the very beginning. Those women some feminists for Obama post and ask you know sort of jumped me into and that's how I became a mom. Had any one other mom Mauprat is actually here with us. Joe in Denver who loves his pundit mom so. It's very esteemed company that I. And I'm so proud to be part of this girl gay anyway. So I think. For me. Just to sort of give sort of an overarching sense of I don't want to rehash in great detail you know the whole Clinton Obama race and gender. I mean I'm sure that will come up in discussion but Hillary just to sort of give an overarching sense. I mean I really felt like what I understood a feminism like deep in my bones about the intersectionality of it was

just tested tried shredded. Stressed to the ultimate during during that whole Democratic primary and it was very very very hard to feel like. Mainstream corporate media frames that sort of only bear. We just learned yesterday by Chris Matthews only barely just yesterday learned what feminism was. I would take issue with that he ever learned that he had heard of the words on the head leaning nothing about women but it was just very stressful on that level alone that those kinds of corporate media or mainstream media frames were kind of defining OK. This is a race versus gender kind of story and that's how we're going to you know describe these little horses in the horse race. So that was that was really just just trying to break free of that. You know. Point and then. The other thing was just you know there's always been and there always will be a lot of internal

dissension and discussion about what feminism is what its goals are. You know how do we understand and how do we define it. What does it look like in practice. All those kinds of issues and I think that really you know was also subjected to intense scrutiny and in some ways it's maybe the silver cloud. I mean the silver lining in the cloud of all that you know it was Jimmy and sort of the wretched discussion of gender but that you know it kind of really galvanized them as communities to to talk about these things again you know really can reawaken us. So for me. You know I also live in California. So on the one hand we saw on Election Day you know Obama elected and so was really Obama was thrilled. And then you know that same day proposition 8. Yes on his past and for a lot of us who believe in marriage equality you know that was just like this tremendous blow. I mean you know we went from. Thinking like in the mid summer oh you know we've got we've got the

statistics you know the odds are with this look you know most people seem to support marriage equality. They don't see a particular reason why we need to define marriage as between a man and a woman and then put that into the California constitution for Pete's sake. So you know there was complacency confusion there was you know it's strategic and organizational chaos and maybe. Lack of you know. Focus on the No on 8 campaign and just for various reasons. You know yes on 8 past and now we have this alteration to our Constitution our state constitution. Most recently I think it was March 5th. You know the repeal. Eight folks and Ken Starr went up to the you know the California Supreme Court and said you know here are the reasons why. You know in May of 2008 you ruled that marriages. Marriage should be open to everyone. Civil union is a sort of separate and unequal kind of category. You know it's it's it's really kind of an inferior sort of

status that you're granting If marriage is legal then it should be for everyone. And then in November of that same year you know suddenly we have this mad woman you know having normative. Heterosexist and homophobic kind of definition of what marriage is all in the States. So that was another opportunity for me to kind of really. Experience all of the stresses on intersectionality again. And and you know as week as we go forward and are talking. You know I imagine that's something that will come up in just close really briefly. It's led me to launch a project. And I think a lot of my interest in my focus is on now what it is to be an activist. Yes. And in what it is to reimagine identity politics but also. What it is to be an ally. You know I really kind of exploring and experimenting at that. And so we launched an essay contest for young people who were. Just

graduating from high school or going to college is targeted at a specific part of the community. The Asian Pacific American community we have an English language category and two Asian language categories so essays written in Chinese or Korean. And the point of it is to argue that marriage equality should be a fundamental civil right. And so it's kind of. An intellectual exercise but it's you know it's also a way for us I think to be kind of engaged in the issues and we have you know college scholarship prize money that offers. So this is kind of a new form of activism and really kind of putting like abstract concepts into play. So I'm really hopeful that we'll get in a very good response and that in this section of the community at least we can get an intergenerational dialogue going. We can talk about. You know we can leverage push those buttons in Asian-Pacific American community where you know parents are really invested in education they want to know about how well you're doing.

Oh you know Prize winning and such. And you know all of this is that I use all that power for good and not evil. So really helping to to have a good effect. And I I've been really kind of able to work through a lot of my own angst about intersectionality and where it fails or succeeds through a project like that. Excellent. Well thank you both very much. Those introductions are meaty and we will definitely something I'd get into a lot of what you just talked about and a lot of what we talked about as well in our discussion. I'm going to frame the discussion for a few minutes I might speak for a few minutes longer than I originally planned because Kim isn't here and Kim was the person on the panel who was going to talk specifically about journalism as a journalist and so as a journalist and a media critic myself I feel like I can I should carry a little bit of that water in Incans absence Eldo Kim is African-American and I cannot carry water for her in that sense. I would never presume but I'm going to try and talk a little bit about journalism and also

about corporate media frames because a lot of the time what what we all blog about is either intended to change those frames. Amongst our own communities online and off line and sometimes to hopefully change those frames in the larger progressive community as well as changing lives and changing plans. That's a good metaphor. We want to change what's on the screen. So we want the media news. My background I should say because I didn't really talk about my record my background is as a journalist and a media critic. And when I founded women in media and news I did so with chronic health as a board member to. Change journalism to increase women's presence and power in public debate and to focus on women who are least often heard. So not so sort of breaking the frame that women equals one monolith that women and in particular that feminist women equals one

particular slice of economic and ethnic and ideological population. We focus our media criticism and our media activism or media of justice work around women who are least often heard. So that means that when we talk about women we talk about women of color and low income women and younger women and older women and immigrant women and try to create spaces for women of all across the spectrum and for women to create their own their own frames and talk back to the media turn the media monologue into a dialogue. So both in terms of our blog and in terms of what I do and what I try to facilitate for other women writers and bloggers and activists is. As a platform and a forum for authentic discussion of how media affects women's communities across the board and how those frames affect not only our ideas about people and politics but also can eventually affect

public policy. So in that sense. The election year was incredibly like I said in the beginning this incredible opportunity and really exciting but also incredibly divisive and troubling and painful at some point because of the breakdown and the failures of the intersectionality the best parts of feminism tended to fall away in certain points along that primary season. So. Some of the frames that I'm talking about so that we can move from sort of generalities to specifics one of the things that a lot of our bloggers at women's voices were writing about and certainly one of the things that I was doing a lot of multimedia presentations about where it touched a little bit about on it online and then did a lot of interactive stuff with with groups across the country was the fact that. As Cinthia I think alluded to we finally finally in corporate media as well as in blogs in liberal blogs that don't

generally talk about race and gender explicitly both corporate media if you want to call them mainstream. That's fine although that's not the frame we use. Who defines mainstream corporate media and liberal blogs we're finally having a discussion about for example the massive amount of sexism in coverage of Hillary Clinton so that you know for example when she left the Times called it the Clinton cackle. For example when she showed up to give a speech on the Senate floor you had a full page Washington Post story about headlines about Hillary's cleavage and what impact her cleavage was going to have on the electoral outcomes. And was it a calculated effect to male voters. No wait it wasn't because she's ugly. And then there was you know there were pundits on Fox News who a particular pundit I can't remember his name right now. I knew it was all committed to memory for a while. I've now purged it ran a PAC called Citizens United not timid emphasizing the acronym the acronym being conned.

And he was the expert. Fox News brought in regularly with the big club symbol behind them talking about whether or not Hillary was effective on the campaign trail etc. saying things like when men when Barack Obama speaks men hear take off for the future. When Hillary Clinton speaks men hear take out the garbage. And you know you had Chris Matthews going on a pretty much one man anti-Hillary tirade calling her a witch calling her every name under the sun. You couldn't even imagine. And you people did Tucker Carlson on MSNBC talking about the Hillary Clinton nutcracker making a lot of sense because every time she comes on screen he likes to cross his legs because she's such a castrating bitch. And this was going on and on Kate you know and I mentioned that it's MSNBC that it's New York Times that it's Washington Post that it's FOX News because it's not just FOX News. Right. So you had. An immense amount of sexism in coverage to the point where it is starting to be noticed not only in the feminist blogosphere but

outside of that it started being noticed in liberal blogs that started being noticed among conservative women who were getting upset when one woman at the highest level of political power in the country was still being dressed down as you know a whiny stumbling bitch basically. And I can say those terms because those were the terms used. It was it was playground bully stuff. And yet. So. OK so finally there was this moment that corporate media. It became a tipping point where all these blogs and community centers and everybody was starting to talk about hey what's going on in media. Why is there such sexism in coverage of this candidate tipping point to the point where now there was a discussion in corporate media around what are we doing around Hillary Clinton. Is there sexism in our coverage. Is that going to have an effect on the election et cetera. Is it sexist or not. Problem is though as media critic first instinct is you say people are finally talking about this. Then I look at all the coverage that's going on and my my immediate

realization is. Holy crap. The only space that is being given to this discussion in corporate media is to people who are willing to say that the reason that all of this sexism is happening in the coverage of Hillary Clinton is that sexism is the single most divisive force in American culture that sexism still exists whereas all the other isms have gone away that racism is a thing of the past. Therefore Barack Obama is getting a free ride in the media and he's being treated as a messiah. And there's no racism in coverage of him and that's why there's sexism in coverage of Clinton. And that's true. Then at that point then you see so there was a Gloria Steinem op ed that I think Cynthia alluded to in the New York Times. Basically I don't remember the exact headline but it basically said that gender is the most restrictive force and that that is why women have a responsibility as women to vote for Hillary Clinton because that's the only feminist thing can possibly do. And if Barack Obama was a woman he would never have the position he has and he would never be

popular etc. then media start because it's the New York Times and as much as we like to say that we're in this new media climate. And you know old news or you know newspapers are dying left and right. Nothing's relevant anymore it's all online. In fact you know in the political sphere politicians read newspapers the TV news often gets you know TV news cycle is dependent on what's in the newspapers that day and the day before that sort of thing. But unfortunately that particular op ed then sparked a huge debate in the blogosphere where people then had Gloria Steinem who is a very respected I will say I respect her work over the years immensely. But. Using that sort of mark of institutional authority then that touched off this really hurtful and problematic debate within the blogosphere among many people who identified as feminists and many people who did it and sort of furthering the race versus gender discussion to really denigrating.

And I think because of course there was a huge amount of racism and coverage of Obama and you know you had first you started off with a news frame of. And you saw this trickling into blogs all over the place. First you have a news frame of Obama is. Everybody loves Obama. You know you remember the the blog. The first thing we heard about Obama in a major sense. You remember the Obama Girl video. Want to talk about the power of viral media who did not see the Obama girl video no one handed the entire room remembers it pretty well. OK so the Obama video the Obama girl video excerpt it on CNN or Fox or any of the cable news. OK. So that's again online affecting corporate media friends corporate media from affecting online. So this idea that everybody was in love with Obama in fact that was not a progressive political

campaign that was a self-interested corporate online humor site. The frame then shifted to Obama was is Obama. Black enough he's not black enough. I either say because he has a white mother or B because he's not radical he's not like Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton or Louis Farrakhan So black people won't like him. This was a corporate media frame. Well OK. Because every black person has to think alike. Then there was then it shifted to actually know all the polls are saying he's that's not an issue. Black voters will support him. OK. Now he's too black. Then you have Fox News and CNN and etc. with all the Reverend Wright clips and God damn America and he's. And then you have the secret Muslim and he are. Can we trust him. That wasn't me that went out for the birth certificate. The New York Post finding a picture of him visiting I believe Somalia with wearing local garb and therefore he must be a terrorist. And it went so it kept shifting right. And then throughout that then you had oh when he was

not patriotic because he refuses to wear a flag pin which he didn't refuse to wear blah blah blah. So you have these media frames that then trickled into the blogosphere both people responding to it and both people and people reinforcing it within all of that you had incredibly contentious debate among feminists and among women bloggers about how do you manage to get your own into interpersonal politics. How do you navigate your identities political and personal within the sphere. And what are the challenges and what we want to talk about today. What are the challenges and what are the opportunities that we learned from that. Very contentious period that we've just lived through. And I want to accomplish I just remembered before I open that question I want to complicated by in a minute. There was all of this. Coverage of Michelle Obama. If it does anybody remember the Fox News discussion of Michelle Obama

that was captioned Obama baby mama. So that's that's Michelle Obama on Fox News. Then it was you know throughout she was originally discussed very very recently until Obama got the nomination. Once he got the nomination coverage of Michelle changed to focus mostly on body and beauty and fashion before he got the nomination it was Michelle Obama is the angry black woman. She hates him and she hates America. She literally calling her there was a round table. I can't remember it's ABC or not roundtable calling her the will. If Obama gets the nomination will we see America's first angry black woman first lady. That was it. That was a direct quote. And then you had you know constantly looking for cover that suggests that they didn't have the New Yorker cover that trickled throughout the blogosphere where you had all the stereotypes of both Michelle and Barack. But if you notice if you remember that cover it was you

know it was Obama himself was depicted as Muslim and they had the Fox News called terrorist fist jab that they're making. But it was Michelle who was depicted as having a machine gun across her shoulder in the in the visual imagery of 70s radicalism. Everybody was scared of Michelle then as soon as he gets the nomination Michelle so beautiful Michelle is the new Jackie O because look at her dress and look at her arms and and etc. she's going to be a fashion maven somehow. It's went back to she's just a girl. Etc. so corporate media frames were saying when they were talking about Michelle Obama were saying that feminists were not doing enough to call out the racism and sexism in coverage of Obama. We were in the blogosphere doing that but they weren't talking to those bloggers who were doing that they weren't looking at Michelle Obama watch etcetera. So opening thus to some of the questions that that came up whether it's the election or whether it's Prop 8 whether it's the ban the ban on

adoption for gay couples. I think the first question I want to know is what do you think was the most challenging aspects of blogging about race and gender this year. You want to. Start off easy. I think. As. Somebody who was a Hillary supporter during the primary it was hard to do that. And not so much excuse the Steinem op ed and the. Ferraro comments it was those were the Geraldine Ferraro comments about Barack Obama happy easy that black man when compared to Hillary as a woman. It was having to navigate

that myself and then communicate that to other people about how I was appalled by both of those instances and not. But. Taking those moments to. Home. To essentially be critical of the feminist movement as a whole and the stereotype that a lot of people have of it be it. Because we have spokes women like Gloria Steinem and Geraldine Ferraro of it being very white. Women middle class movement and talking about how I wrote a piece I did a lot of my political blogging actually during the election at a site called work at Mom Mom dot com. And I wrote a piece for them about Geraldine Ferraro you know breaking my heart essentially with homines and ignoring racism in this country. And that yes on very many levels I can say that male privilege. Is at play. But

to ignore the racism that is also in play in Obama's world in all of this was irresponsible for her. Other you know to to to try and put those two things against each other. I I think I could subscribe to the idea of male privilege kind of. Outweighs them all in some sense but that. But they're pitting of those two things were playing into the corporate media's structure and really fueled to. Actually some great conversation I heard on the blog that I was writing for. I think it was stressful because I think that you know we're so we're sort of an implied coalition with one another. And and it's all scary and troubling and disturbing to feel like Alan's desert and the being abandoned and in a weird way like you

know thinking and thinking about the exchanges that went what went on. You know I think women of color have always had a sort of sketch with scepticism about how woman. What does that describe you is describing. Because so often it did not describe you know African-American women Asian and Latino you know Native women and. And so I think there was just a great deal of sensitivity there about that coalition holding together and wanting that coalition to hold together. And when it doesn't seem to hold together you know just the enormous pain of that. You know I'm thinking about how you know there was tremendous outcry about how Hillary was discussed. It depicted dissect her body dissected in the corporate media and I think you know even. I think some women of color like myself were kind of waiting for you know equal outcry about Michelle Obama you know being

angry Angela Davis or whatever. And that kind of extends up until like just last week when you know Tammy Bruce and some you know right wing. Right or at town hall dotcom is saying that. I think Tammy Bruce said that Michelle Obama is trash. In the White House and that this man Bruce let's get town hall some right wing web site said that that she's a bitch and you know later they said that from the website. So you don't see it there unless you go through some maneuvers. But you know and wasn't that awesome. Some joke about some you know very thinly veiled joke about the Obama puppy the Obama dog and she's like oh see because bitch. Right. So it's kind of like the in New disguised way of like you know basically being able to call a woman a bitch and a woman of color. And the first lady a first lady as much as I dislike Laura Bush. I've never called her a bitch you know. So.

So I think that I think when we when I as a woman of color see an imbalance like that it's it's distressing. It's distressing because that sort of further reinforces the notion that old women must only mean white women then. Because look at the tremendous energy in protecting defending you know circling the wagons around Hillary et cetera. And then that is not equivalent kind of thing is happening when it's a woman of color. You know. So. I think you know that's just kind of talking about like sort of a very subjective and emotional sort of response I like and am I'm not trying to say that this was everything that I suspect that for women of color you know was it that was part of the feeling you know. And on the other side you know I think women of color who are feminists really didn't try to say yes the misogyny is just unbelievable it's crazy. You know no one wants a senator Hillary Clinton as secretary of state to be called these things depicted is these things you know

you know. Alluding to as any of these things you know in the end it was a it was distressing that there was not just the same kind of risk for Casati in terms of you know the energy of the critique. Right right. So that's actually what I was going to ask and I will ask this after because my immediate follow up to that question was going to be after what is what was the most challenging thing about watching that race and gender what were the really positive lessons and what were the ways that we shifted the debate in a positive way. What are the opportunities that were there that we can learn from. I will ask that again in a minute but what you just said reminded me that I wanted to ask you both something look at kind of a theory that I've been. Kind of turning over about why it was that logger's as well as corporate media as well just sort of citizens wanting to figure out about voting and all of it why it was why the outrage over Clinton and not the outrage and not even the

recognition that there was that there was racism in discussion of Barack Obama throughout the candidacy and also discussion of Michelle. My theory is that part of it is that a there has been so much. Sexism in coverage of female politicians. I mean the first time I wrote about it was maybe 84 when why didn't write about this in 84 I was 10 but in 84 Geraldine Ferraro was introduced on national television by I believe it was Tom Brokaw as being a size six at the Democratic National Convention and the first female vice presidential candidate size 6 was how she was introduced on TV. So this has been going on for a very long time. Very little notice has been paid to it. I've written about it for 15 years now. No you know but this was the first time that somebody was running for president at a time when there was an online community that people were able to express their own opinions even if the White Male media establishment weren't expressing those opinions in the first place. So there was this and it's it was stuff that was easy to see.

Right. I think that. Part of the problem with having the conversation about race in terms of how both the Obamas work to Pictet at what is because we as our country and our society doesn't view we don't want to talk about race. I want to believe that we're race blind that we're post-racial. And the fact that. When he when Obama won Iowa it was mine. It. Race is over. Right. I. Voted for him. Right. If there's any race party this country with red white people and so I think now we're right. That was the theme that was the Viale And so to you I think from corporate media and for individuals to really stop and say look the coverage is racist would have had meant that we'd have to explore our own

racisms and people do want to do that big. And I don't think that. I don't think the camp he'd wanted that to happen either because they were writing this kind of feel good. We're all in it together. We were all colorblind and you know I'll be disappointed or I didn't. I think know I think I think both yes maybe even like the whole party wanted to and we had this idea of I'm from Chicago so I would like Obama land. And although Hillary is homegirl too and. We had all these like urbanites and people of color and me going into Iowa into Wisconsin into Indiana and trying to talk to these people who you know. You know their stereotypical you know racists essentially wouldn't take over somebody from Iowa would vote for a black man. And that was the conversation. And we wanted to just keep believing that and believe in that and

we still are trying to believe that. Right. Well that's my my my theory is that. So the first part was that you know people were finally noticing the sexism. But the reason that I think people noticed it is it was simple it was. Here's this woman who has a lot of power. She's a senator she's running for president. We're still talking about her clothes her hair her laugh her body thighs et cetera. It's. Really simple stuff. Right. But the racism in coverage of Obama and blogging about Obama and in the public debate about Obama was a very coded. You know when people use the term post-racial in corporate media there's a whole lot of coded stuff attached that racism is a thing of the past. Nothing is left to overcome. When when you when the discussion of Obama as an affirmative action candidate was out there a couple of times by Glenn Beck by others they didn't have to say he's unqualified. He's a lazy black man. There has been 30 years of coverage of different reaction coded

to get you to think that when you hear the phrase affirmative action so so much of the anti-patriotic or radical or angry he didn't get to flesh out those arguments they just had a say code words. And we who understand the history of racism in this country would understand what that is but people who aren't political in general might not understand that record but I don't know. Do you think that there was possibly. Do you think it's an issue of education of what is a simple sort of surface level. The way a certain kind of ism plays out on the surface. For example sexism in coverage of Hillary and the way that coded frames are are harder to decipher. Does that happen. I think I think I would agree with you in that the manipulation of racial codes is is kind of really. Subtly insidious in the way that the sort of over the heads you know sledgehammer sexism misogyny was much more

overt and detectable. But I also think like in terms of how the campaigns were run and you know this is my interpretation. I mean it seemed to be like Obama really shied away from being the black candidate you know. And it really took Reverend Wright to sort of lock him up. Right. And a concerted effort by McCain and also Clinton to sort of lock him up that way and that was you know something I really had a huge problem with. But I think that you know I mean I remember reading late into the primaries about how Obama offices regional offices in various cities all over were subjected to sort of like these hate crime vandalism. And this was like way into the primary. This was like well it was like July almost August and you know pretty much knew who was going to be the nominee at that point. And it was I just thought it was so interesting because. It

was never something that the Obama campaign like ever I think in fact they tried to probably quash that story in The New York Times because they just really wanted to avoid any sense of like. This kind of monster that's in our history and you know can rise up at any time and it's in any you know take over. We can still see that in Obama's last press conference somebody asked him. Yes. I can't remember who it was or asked him about race if he was a woman about race. I believe a radio like him and he was like no I've been talking about the economy. Hello. You know race in media race is a factor in the economy. He just doesn't want to talk about it which is why I think that they tried to keep playing this hole where each other no matter what color we are. Well I think but it's also really kind of tough. For me was to see the Clinton campaign then start sort of taking up like these things. Well sure. He's a citizen so far as I know right.

History. So I have this kind of trajectory with Clinton you know really just really wanting her to just be right up there you know as either Obama or Clinton the Clinton Obama had this fantasy like oh so amazing to have the he and friends et cetera et cetera. But it just it was not going to happen and that the overwhelming tragedy for me of this departure was that we could have had like oh my God twice the history you know how amazing. And it just it didn't work. And that was what was so frustrating about. The outcome. The Pluma blog was that they were just they continue to harp on Obama every time he had some sort of Popal about women or isn't out 110 percent on women's issues. But they continue to ignore the racism that the Hillary campaign said that as well as her you know like supportive of the 96 welfare reform which who abysmal for women specifically women

especially women of color. Yes. And I think when you push them to do those sorts of things they're just like. Kind of a blind spot for me in that. You know. Now we come to find out that the repeal of Glass-Steagall which created as you know a firewall between the commercial banks and the investment banks and now you know that that's been removed and part of the reason why we're in this you know economic disaster. Well that was a piece of legislation that Clinton signed Bill Clinton. So you know like even in trying to engage on the issues on the on the record. I mean part of the difficulty I had with Hillary Clinton was. Wanting to kind of have it both raise in some ways so like she's sort of trading on you know the Clinton brand meaning you get the two of us. The thing was well yes. But then there's the LAFTA thing to golfing and telecom mergers ever. Right.

So it was kind of frustrating in not respect trying to talk about the issues or even to say you know where are you on these issues. And so I think that was really troubling for me to hear. So here I would like to get this has all been really meaty and I'm very glad we got into it in as much depth. But I'd like us to not necessarily move now from the election itself into sort of larger issues around blogging and I think that well one thing I want to say before it is just the puma one thing that I think a lot of us as bloggers we took the bait to some degree I think we as bloggers need to be really careful about taking the bait. And we need this is where citizen journalism is very important. We need to be look you know using those FOI requests we need to be doing research. As a journalist and as a media critic I'm trained to not always believe what I see and hear from corporate media. Now the Pumas I believe it was mamzerim or caught it. If it wasn't it was another one of those sort of Howard feminist bloggers. I did some research and found that the puma PAC was basically McCain supporters. It wasn't Hillary Clinton's supporters it

was formed very late in the primary it wasn't. So it was basically a bait and switch. People pretending they were outraged about sexism in the campaign coverage of the campaign and so now they we're not going to support Obama because it was a success against Clinton. In fact it was it was you know infiltrator you know stuff about trying to move the media debate and trying to move the blogosphere debate and some degree we all we those of us who did took the bait. And that's something we need to be able to watch out for in the future about not just falling into those traps a little more care. I would say that wild part of the Pumas were a trap. You know they really emerged as Sarah Palin supporters. Right. And this is a preview of my talk blog her. Here she is. So what happened is that the Poom is really you know they they've really ended up going for Palin in the whole sense of women who hear us roar meow kind of thing.

Purring for you now am saying. I wrote a piece just after Palin. Came on the scene at work it mom about called Why Sarah Palin is good for feminism because it really forced us to have this conversation especially people who may not be as radically left in their feminism about what it means to be a feminist as pro. Is it pro-women all the time is it. Do we have a litmus test. And it was at my most successful piece ever in terms I got like 46 comments. And some of them were like yeah I'm totally and utterly a feminist. I'm proud to see a strong and thoughtfully provoke national conversation emerge from an anti-woman GOP nominee as a Hillary supporter. I'd never be so ignorant as to vote for Palin just because she's a woman. Someone else wrote I don't get it. Palin should be the feminist hero. The only thing she takes opposite on them is abortion.

And then she goes on about all this yeah OK. And all of these things and then it it turns into a conversation about what is a feminist issue. Is it just abortion is God. I have to take that I take a very broad definition of feminism and that includes gun laws. And people were like No guns have nothing to do with feminism. And it's really interesting. So why is that so. Well I took the bait in some way. I thought that it really helped expand the conversation. So I have a question. I think that it's actually a question for you first but also for you. So moving from the election based discussion to. What you both talked about a lot about even starting in your introductions and in all of the discussion so far and even what I discussed today it can kind of boil down to problematic media frames being repeated sometimes in the blogosphere or the frustration that we might have as bloggers who focus on through a progressive antiracist that pro-feminist lens our frustration at how how to break those frames. Right. So the in

question to Obama about you know can we discuss race and he basically says no. What out now is it time I guess. Well I'd like to ask that question that was supposed to be the follow up to the first question which is what are what do you see as the real sort of sunshine moments the real opportunities that we've gained this year whether it's through politicizing the Mommy Wars sphere whether it's through recreating a discussion about intersectionality and where can we go from here. What are our responsibilities to change those frames and how to do it. OK. I just would respond by saying but in some ways you know kind of going right from Geraldine Ferraro. To you know some of the less. Savory parts of the Clinton campaign to Sarah Palin. First of all I mean. That to me in my interpretation becomes sort of like a warning that you know single

issues. Throw ideas of feminism. Can really kind of circle back around in a very uncomfortable way you know because there's not a there's not the attachments to other you know you're not in coalition with other people and so therefore there's kind of an element of narcissism almost in it it's like. Well you know I can only be for people who look exactly like me. And you know that's a lot of what I heard in the in the payment support sometimes was like she's just a regular mom and I'm a regular mom too and you know she might be a hockey mom but I'm a soccer mom and you know that's like the basis for identification. And so what I would like to. Say is that you know I think that many many white people many many white women really sort of saw this happening and were kind of aghast you know that that we could have this kind of trajectory where our focus

only on women as a very sort of narrow interpretation of that white well educated you know upper middle class et cetera all the things that you know both Geraldine Ferraro and Hillary are if not Sarah Palin I wouldn't say she's very well educated. But anyway. Five coaches so that's five times the education now more colleges. Yes exactly. But the thing is you know to me that was that was like. A warning signal. You know this is kind of what happens when there's not there's not a feminist. And I make explicit a feminist commitment to coalition to ensure intersectionality to saying that yes my identity was this but it is so interwoven and so many other. Modes of being that I'd liken it to the Rubik's Cube Rubik's Cube you got six sides. There is theoretically they're all one color you want to get them to be on one color but they could be like a mixture of

different colors. Right. And and. Actually talked about this at blogger last year at the Race to Nowhere. You know ordinarily we walk around and we're just we are that bundle of all different colors on every single side of us because you why take you how could you remove the cat lover from the mother from the Chinese-American from the woman. It's just all extricated right. You can't pull it apart. But there are times as we you know when you discriminate against say before we had the Lilly Ledbetter Act you know there's you discriminated against as a woman and all of those squares that say women kind of come to the fore. And there's there's a time for that kind of strategic essential as I call it. Know there's a time for that to come to the fore to be sort of the main front to be the thing that can launch you in and mobilize you into coalition with other women you know other people in the same category. And I think that can be very powerful. And that's not something I would want to give up. But at the same time I

wouldn't want to dwell there. You know I mean I think it's like a place you can go and do action from that to kind of like live there the whole time is. Is. A little risky I think that's you know we're we sort of. Get Geraldine Ferraro on one end and Sarah Palin on the other extreme it's like I'm I'm a woman and that's never been unpacked you know. So for me I think the sunny part are the positive parts is just sort of reexamining what it means to be in coalition with intersectionality means how it is that you are intellectually honest and maybe you know sort of emotionally courageous to say that you know I have privilege I cop to it. I have privilege in these what I'm you know upper middle class educated able bodied it's you know et cetera straight. Right. But then I say in these other ways you know it doesn't keep a homeless man from calling me a check. Do you say so. You know you just sort of be honest about that and to own that and to say that OK well given that I'm this bundle

you know how. How can I how can I advance an agenda. How can I also be an ally within another agenda. You know I don't have to determine that agenda but I can stand strongly so that that's what I am telling you but my experiment with you know as a straight ally working with folks the local Los Angeles County flight. And. So I worked with Asian Pacific Islanders equality you know equality Los Angeles and just you know we got co-sponsorship from the essay contest phase and I'm like yeah. So that's. Yeah my own Web 2.0 Kenny-Bob's blogging. It's a bloody thing definitely because I want to bring the conversation back to as much as we're talking about our activist identity. How do we do this activism online because that's what we said we were talking about. As a blogger I read what you're talking about intersectionality and what I asked about breaking the frames can you can just realize that for

people who have bloggers in the room for people who comments and blogs commenting is just as much a part of the community. And then after you ask that I'm going to ask you to respond to some of the same thing specifically to the idea of what are the opportunities as bloggers to break the frame online and in corporate media. And then after we answer those two questions we're going to open up a group since I suspect that pretty quickly by saying you know this seems like a great opportunity to kind of beat out the debt and be that good ally and to kind of mobilize you know sort of the social media resources available to get the word out. The contest and also to work you know sort of in three dimensional space with real people you know to kind of. Take what's on line and you know bring it back off line and then bring it back online for maximum impact. And where can they find out if people on the program called API dash t he flag dot blogspot dot com so I could put it up on the left burgles

afterwards. So one of the sunshine moments builds on. What you are saying is that the. It forced a new conversation and particularly in the mom blog. Community really seemed to be that. Howard said that that moment the election whether it was the primary or the general kind of for was that moment where a lot of mom bloggers who. Would say at. Least a. Blogger even wrote a. Wrapper around a post about this to a lot of mom bloggers like I just talked about my kids and family in a very happy gender. Amy and like a very happy sunshiny way or not always sunshiny but just that. Because I just want to be that kind of blogger came out and were saying like I don't

normally blog about politics but I just have to get this off my chest and I am definitely I subscribe to the idea that once you get that off your chest it's always going to be there. And the next time you won't need like a ton of bricks to push you over that cliff and just maybe a tiny little breeze. Well. One of my favorite blogs that I've been reading for years the pieces of my life. Actually the blogger lives in the Boston area. So since 2002 she's had 10 instances of writing a post that starts out with something like I don't do politics but I have to say this. But she clearly talks about politics a lot when she comments about her kids and how they interact with each other. There was one instance where she was blogging about her son and daughter in a Monopoly game and how her daughter was just loving the fact that she was willing to drop money in real estate and pull the plug and she made some comments about. She has these as you know she is showing signs of a

future Republican. That's a very political thing to say on a blog you know about your children. Yet she didn't quite and I've seen that in other blogs other mom blogs where you make those kind of comments but don't connect the fact that is a very political statement. Joanne's site who's just actually left Pundit Mom. She was doing a series of blog pieces called Mothers of intention where she was asking bloggers who don't identify as political to come in on her first sight. Right. And one of them Joe Jota for had said she. She started off the post like I promised myself I would never write about politics on this site. Those of you who aren't moms I think the mom community in virtual and real life lends itself to this like sensory of politics because you kind of learn you kind of lean on each other for a lot of things and you don't want your politics to get involved in that because you might need somebody to pick up after school one day. So I thought that

was a really sunshiny moment was the fact that I think that a lot of people who don't see themselves as political because that's part of what I try to do with my politics is that infuse that politics in the moms sphere and really came out excellent. And do you have anything to say about her about how we in the room and others in the blogosphere can can work to change frames both online and in corporate media. Gosh you don't have you don't want to know. Well then I'll just say that as a media critic and as a journalist and as a blogger and as an editor of many many women bloggers feminist bloggers there's a difference to vulgarisms bloggers. I do think it's incredibly important for all of us to be conscious of the frames that are used both in corporate media about issues and politics and legislation but also about our identities and to unpack those regularly first for ourselves and those hard conversations with our friends and our activists communities and our academic communities before we or

maybe even through our writing. But it's it's imperative that we identify and unpack that kind of coded framed language so that we then can be aware of not taking the bait so that we can be aware of not just the simple surface level. This is sexist because they're talking about a woman's body but not understanding what it means to say that Barack Obama is the affirmative action candidate or that he's not black enough or he's too black. You know or that we're post-racial you know if we can change those frames. And recognize those frames for ourselves and then use those recognitions to provoke questions and dialogue online and also hopefully use link politics and use online coalitions to start pushing more unified more progressive pro-feminist anti-racist messages not only through the progressive feminist blogosphere but through the liberal blogosphere which doesn't often get explicit about race and gender at all. And then outside into corporate media. So you know if you have a

small progressive on this blog if you can figure out ways to get say Huffington Post or Daily Kos to start actually engaging in a discussion that they might not be engaging in actively then that might start to shift and get some coverage to change a frame on Hannity or at least be discussed on Hannity Montane Hannity scream. But maybe you maybe you get some coverage or some movement out of Rachel Maddow Show that way it's it's getting not only online but off line too. Of that I think you know want to open soon. Yes. We have to remember that the outrage that happened about Pastor Warren and the inauguration happened at started on the blogosphere and then it just trickled up right shot up into the corporate media. And the other thing about changing frames is that what. Another thing that Sarah Palin did I think to the blogosphere was how people. Think about how moms are situated and stereotyped in political campaigns because she was trying to play as like an everyday mom. Right. Throwing herself a hockey

mom. And I blogged on my personal site about the different the economic difference between being a hockey mom and soccer mom and the amount of dollars that. That is. And that's a very class issue. And I think a lot of the moms who are reading my side were like Yeah. And so they had made us you know come to consider when political campaigns cost soccer moms or security moms or what they're doing with the mom label. Yeah right. Just two cents on this. I mean I think there's a sense that you know a mom you know how like how kind of de-fang and soft and squishy could you get. But you know I have never been so radicalized when I became a mother to take the stakes for everything became so clear it was like 100 years of occupation Everette on my side. Not up to the death you know the model came out. So I mean I think that it can be really powerful. And if you need to kind of adopt the just just you know

Sure mom you know you can think what you want but you know I hear more thing you can be very careful and galvanizing and I think that marketers others in the progressive blogosphere tuned in you know corporate media they make the mistake of really kind of underestimating the mommy blogosphere. You know there's something really powerful going on and it's not just the progressive voices I mean there's some really interesting things going on with the conservative moms online which I'm a little. Nervous about now that we have we have about 15 minutes for questions and. Anything it's open whatever however you want to direct the conversation. We have probably even heard you mentioned the New Yorker cover and that was really interesting to me. But I but no one said I wanted to know what it was like a valid critique of the conversation or if it was a really problematic choice for that publication.

I just have to say that I don't buy the hipster term of satire. So I don't. I mean I don't subscribe to what is generally said as a hipster satire in terms of the New Yorker or ironic t shirts of stereotypes that are in you know on sold on the Internet or on the Mall things like that so I'm pretty hardcore. Fans of The New Yorker cover. I think it's a really that's a really complex question because that's so grounded in identity. People had such strong feelings about it being just a joke or just funny or a really good journalistic attempt to collect all of the stereotypes and comments on it satirically and others thought you know what this is incredibly dismissive and derogatory where I fall as a media critic. One. I don't care. I know in terms of women media news political vantage point and media criticism lens intention is not as important as content. I don't care if the editors who decided to put that on the cover were

well-meaning or intended it as a joke or intended it as a slam. I care about what did that. What was it. What was the impact of having these stereotypes on the cover. I think as editors they understood one. We all know the last couple of weeks has become very clear. The changing stakes in media and sales and marketing and media money they know that the most controversial cover you can get is the one that sells more. That's one and two. I think that if they really wanted to make a satirical point or a media criticism commentary point about stereotypes racism and coverage of Obama they would have put that story about that cartoon inside the magazine and annotated it or had an article with it or et cetera inside not on the cover without any comment. Because on the cover it looked like every other right wing attack if you look at because I am from New York so there are magazine stands everywhere it looks no different than any of the other magazines.

The National Review. Exactly. Could have been the national view. I mean I think it was failed satire and I was trained as a literary critic so I'm really picky about like with words and all these other things and I think that the element of subversion and sort of a framing you know like something pointed out if that cover had been in a little thought bubble that was attached to Rush Limbaugh's head then that might have been stung but it didn't. Exactly right. It didn't. It was just the cover. So you know I think in my definition of what a sad terms of very field. Is about the action piece and you learn about intersectionality in coalition building. How do we do that through the blog sphere. You know I mean I think the blogosphere is wonderful in terms of connecting But then once you've connected there's got to be something that you're doing you know back out into real life and so I mean in some ways I go back to on CNN you know tell it slant and I think that in some ways you know maybe kind of going at it sideways like gardening it's like gardening is your thing.

You know there's so much that's going on in terms of like urban and community gardening victory gardens for people who are food insecure growing like an extra roll. I mean I think like actually kind of getting your hands dirty again like going to the blogosphere and getting nourished and getting inspired. And they kind of taking it back out with you into the real world and trying to find an application for it. I mean I think that I think that's what people take away from the Obama campaign knew they learned by doing. White people learned about racism because they were just knocking on doors trying to get somebody to vote for a candidate. And suddenly you know you've got someone who's got you know whatever kind of attitudes and things. And it's shocking to me. You know if you're not. Writing that you think well OK. Post-racial sure. This shouldn't matter in some and. Like there it is you know so I mean I think like this it's really key to kind of take take it back out and then circulate it back in. You know. Are Just two things about introduce yourself. Sorry Shereen digital sisters blog women white men women in media news.

Couple other blogs as well Barker. We've been trying to point out that not just in terms of that you know in terms of the satire part. Just really quickly one of the things I think that was missed also was that there was images that came from the community who said you know this is our reaction. And they actually had T-shirts of her in a very ways and very different like you know where you didn't have the afro so that that's the perspective of the angry black woman thing. She was very much who she is now basically with a lot facts but still. And so it was very interesting to watch something like that happen. But yet there was no coverage on those images that were created from the specific community that was being targeted by the news but that by that cover. So I always feel that we're we are missing something because we're not actually picking up on stuff like that and calling it satire but we're missing what what the community is actually saying. And then the second part was just in terms of when we talk about this I mean it's across the board not just

because of the candidate whoever the candidate was whether it was Hillary or Barack but I know I have someone that would consider a friend who said that she wrote a letter you know to say to Michelle Obama your husband run and she got attacked in a way that you know was not expected because it was uncommon for her to get that kind of experience whereas had I written that it would have been you know a normal been acceptable. And I think that that's the sort of barrier that we're trying to cross in terms of what's acceptable for certain groups and what's acceptable for me. So had she not been a white woman doing that no one with the seven thing but because she was and he was a black candidate it changed every time. And we just kind of it needs to be careful of things that we look at these images. That do just say I think I've seen some bits I mean. About the classy image of Michelle Obama and being used as really redefining for us what it means to be a

black family in America when really I think that black America looks like that. I mean I think it's more about the conversation really should be about. Us change going from our stereotype of black America black family to what the reality is as opposed to then modeling in some sort of new black family in America. Right. Yeah. So let's say again all levels of class. So one thing that Sherene that you just said that I think is again goes back to my question earlier about what are our opportunities and responsibilities and how can we be friends if there was not enough conversation in corporate media about the generated the community generated ground of positive images. That's where we come in. Right. So that's where our sort of bloggers can start to move images up whether it's online or hopefully out into sort of the ripple effect out

into shifting public debate both online and online and in corporate media. And I think that we can't wait for. We shouldn't discount our own power as writers both in independent press and an independent online news media spheres by just waiting for corporate media to find those images because they're always going to find the image that's on the cover of a made national corporate magazine. They're not going to necessarily find the images in our community and even if they find them they're not going to necessarily want to publicize them for example so the image makeover. I remember back before the during the primaries you had Chris Matthews doing a segment on on MSNBC about Michelle Obama having a quote unquote political image makeover after the I'm not proud of my country saying that you know was misrepresented Michelle Obama. Is she having a political image makeover. And what did the 30 second MSNBC commercial have during the promo bump for that for that segment.

It was stripper graphics holograms of stripper graphics behind her. That was her image make over from you know the crazy black woman who's you know because she basically all it was was she's an African-American woman so therefore we can use this really derogatory image. I mean why that would never have been if if Hillary Clinton or Laura Bush needed to have a political image make over based on what they had said would they ever put a pole dancer behind them in a 30 second ad so we can't count on corporate media to find our images. We have to get those images out and it's our responsibility to talk about that both from our communities and in allied support. And if I could just kind of follow up you mentioned really briefly like the link politics and the CEO. I mean that's all true. Jim has a search engine optimization so just to respond to Sheen's point. You know I actually bought my husband a T-shirt that had that image of like oh that's cute anyway. But you know here's an example where in the blogosphere you know if you are linking

to something like that you can make it bubble up. Right. The more people who do stories on. And so I think that's kind of like a sort of lateral sort of move and instead of what often happens in the blogosphere and especially in blogging journalism because we don't have the resources to enterprise reporting. You know I'm lucky to be able to fly over to Iraq anytime and live what's going on over there. We rely on the mainstream media or corporate media and so our links are really kind of media and they're sort of derivative and they link back up to sort of these power sources and we're commenting on them critiquing them whatever and that's valuable. But we can also be linking to one another and driving you know these little things that deserve to bubble up you know up into into consciousness. And I think that you know we talked a little bit before about how on things like from the daily quotes you know did things have kind of emerged out of there and gotten into you know the New York Times or what have you kind of you know larger corporate media outlets. So I think that's possible and maybe what we can do sort of

grassroots wise is really kick it up to sort of the sideline where we thought you know whoever you know is is is a bigger fish in the pond and get noticed that. We it's we have four more minutes until the end of the session so we might have time for one or two more questions depending on how quick they are. So. I. Think. You are and those that are working these leadership will change that or for women's rights. My question is about how do you take online organizing and our online messaging. Because it's such an important issue to put to change the images of black men and women in general of moms etc. How do we bring that message of unity so that people are aware of the way that media talks about. These issues and how to create more media literacy communities. I just say just start reading. I mean.

Probably a year ago I would have said that meetup dot com was irrelevant to my life but after I started to be more active on Twitter it just seems to be more relevant because I've seen that the more people converse online the more and. If you have the ability to localize and figure out who you're conversing with who are in your community from the more you want in the job. That's what I think a lot of us feel this weekend is like finding a new interface to handle. And then you just take that and decide you want to do that in your neighborhood whether it's in the city or you know Southside side thing. So you do want to talk to that as well. I feel like we've talked a little bit. OK. Well I will mention that two things that might sound contradictory but the first thing that I'll say is I think it's in terms of media literacy that's a whole other thing that's media literacy is you should not start from online and go into the

community and you can you know we need to be teaching media literacy in the community and we can use online to support that and sort of broader than that. I don't think that we. I think that it's not necessarily the most useful model too. It's very I think it gets a very top down to say how can we get our messaging from online into the community where it's sort of a newer new media version of the kind of failed models. Let's talk about let's change policy by starting in D.C. and then you know swooping into a local community a local town in Iowa or Chicago or wherever and tell them what they need. It's the models that tend to work much more effectively. And because New Media Tools are generally much cheaper than a lot of other organizing tools have been in the past. So we have such a great opportunity right now to use not only blogging but podcasting but video but radio low power FM radio is another really great resource. It's not necessarily an online thing but we have the

ability now to go into to go into communities. But I think to start from communities community based organizations can bring in people who have you know strategic skills building around new media and technology and be able to use those to the best. Effect that those communities are determining. So basically you know if you're involved in community organizing then you know use those new media tools to advance the messages that those communities are determining from the ground up. And if you're not in community organizing but you want to help that get in touch with the community organizers don't start out with an agenda get in touch with them ask them what they need and how you can support them with your online work. And then also go into those communities with those tools and say OK so here's how you know skills building workshops are so great. Here's how you do video. Here's how you blog. Here's here here's how easy it is to log on and get get yourself a Wordpress or whatever.

And then the last thing that I'll say is for all of us an inspiring little success story or a sort of tactic story my friend and activist colleague Dan Quaoar who runs the Texas media empowerment project in San Antonio and works with low income women people of color immigrant women in San Antonio is able to regularly generate hundreds and hundreds of people to show up to for example. Meetings are about the FCC to raise you know fighting media consolidation. Showing up to protest. Clear Channel Radio the largest radio owner in the country with more than 200 I believe it is radio stations shoot she can get people who you know are totally outside the academe academic and even outside the activist sphere to show up on you know six hour notice by just putting out a little bulletin on Twitter. And she has hundreds of followers or via Facebook and previously MySpace and she gets activists to show up to do media activism and anti-racists anti-TSA antiracist pro feminist

organizing using those simple simple tools. So that's the skills building is the way to go. I think you're welcome and thank you so much everybody for coming in. Wow one last question. OK. Well thank you so much for coming. Again the the Web sites that we represent are W I am an online dot org. It is women and media and news Web site and you can click over to the women's voices blog Veronica. Out. There on the track web. For that video. You want to say it out loud out of. Evil feminists that come. OK. So you want to say out loud for the video what your blog is. Say it's a. Couple of. Minutes. Past. And I will say this also before we if anybody wants to write about issues related to women and media in any capacity racism gender gender issues

that are clear issues labor we take guests columns all the time around the issues at women's voices so feel free to email me director at W I am an online. Thank you so much everybody.