Me and my guy snuggling on New Year’s Day. #365FeministSelfie
Yesterday, I spotted a blog post called #365FeministSelfie — Are you in? from Viva la Feminista. In the post, Veronica challenges the weird idea that Jezebel posted earlier this year that selfies are a cry for help and somehow anti-feminist. As if recording life – including our own faces – is merely a pathetic plea to lookatmelookatmeloooookaaaaatmeeeeeee!
That’s not it. Unless you’re hoping your Instagram feed will catapult you to a career as a model, the selfies most of us post are simply records of special moments or hasty attempts to “put mom in the picture”. Sometimes selfies are show-offy, sometimes self-deprecating, sometimes they’re a soapbox, sometimes they’re just plain fun. But they’re certainly not anti-feminist or pathetic.
Veronica is challenging readers to do a 365 day selfie challenge, to put our feminist faces out there every day. I didn’t jump at the idea right away because I (rather smugly) don’t have a big hang-up about broadcasting my bad hair days and under-eye circles for all the world to see. Life is life, ya know? I figured no one wants to look at 365 photos of me at Trader Joe’s or on my couch since that’s kind of all there is for me lately. Then it dawned on me: that’s all there is for me these days. What’s that about? Why is my orbit so small that there’s so little worth selfie-ing? That’s lame.
Did my feminist foremothers work their asses off so I could shop for tasty breakfast blend coffee and read blogs? Well, yes they did since they were all about personal choices but I bet they’d be more enthusiastic about me getting out there and doing things. Big things! Fun things! Community things! Activist things! And also buying more breakfast blend coffee because we all need fuel, yo.
So, the #365FeministSelfie Challenge for me isn’t a call to let down my guard about my appearance. It’s a call to up my game as a feminist, as a mother, as a neighbor, as a friend, as a wife, and as a blogger. I need to keep pushing outward on the walls of my life and doing things that connect me to the world. I won’t succeed every day and my selfies will often portray the most ordinary of lives. But maybe sometimes there will be pictures that show me with my feet firmly planted in the world, participating and helping to make change where I can.
If you want to see my feminist selfies, check out my new Instagram account StayAtHomePundit or just check in here and look for the updates in my sidebar. I’ll also be trying to produce more blog posts so this site may actually become interesting again!
Happy New Year!
I just wanted to say that I’m super jazzed that you’re doing this, too. I’m enjoying expanding my horizons and meeting new feminists through the project, but I’m also glad to see a few outspoken ladies I “know” (even if through the Internet) jump on board.