The Feminist Pub - come on in, chat, ask a quick question, ramble ... whatever you like!

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Hello and welcome! Pull up a chair!

This thread started when we all decided to imagine what the perfect local for feminists would be like. So far, it has taps with plenty of good real ale, and some decent non-alcoholic alternatives too. There are comfy chairs and there's a feminist film night, as well as lots of nice feminist-friendly books on the shelves and space to curl up and read. The open-mic nights are attracting feminist singers and comedians, and we're just sorting out the feminist creche.

Old thread is here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/1875250-The-Feminist-Pub-is-Open-Chat-Rant-or-pull-up-a-chair-here. But don't feel you need to read or catch up - just jump in.

I'm having a nice cup of earl grey but there is wine mulling as requested.

What can I get anyone?

Oh dear, Lord Copper, are you still ploughing up and down the swimming pool after all this time? You must be very wrinkly, but I admire your stamina.

well at least Borgen passes the Bechdel test with flying colours.

Also I love it when she does that really charming smile with a wrinkly nose.

Oh, yes, 'tis a feminist nose

I am not sure that I have a problem with Brigitte's marriage failing ?in part due to her high-powered job etc etc. I think that is a reality for a lot of people in demanding/unpredictable and high hours/high responsibility jobs - men and women. There's many a man in a fancy job on his 2nd or 3rd marriage. Her husband just did not make a particularly good 1950s housewife - and who could blame him !

I want Katrine to get it back together again with Kaspar - he looks much better with his longer hair in this serious .

May I also comment on the styling of all the characters while I am being shallow? I love how everybody is attractive but not overtly in-yer-face pornified : women look like women, they have rounded bits in various places, some of them might even be fat , the clothes are chique but not trying-too-hard. The men have soft sides (Kaspar clearly loves his son even if he does not know that his favourite 'dog' is a 'cat') and they are not absurdly buff.
I watched ep 1 and 2 on iPlayer and when it was done, there was Geordie Shore - my eyes, my eyes!!

yep I love all that stuff too - though actually I am not super keen on Kespar's long hair - you can have him ;)

I love Katrine's strong body in her jogging stuff and her dressed-down look at home. And Birgitte has great style. so great to see real women looking great, not plasticky.

not sure what is on iplayer right now so a little wary of spoilers...?

ep 1 and 2 only AFAIK.

I don't want Kaspar; Katrine should have him and ride in to the sunset with him and have more babies and run her hands through his hair . Oops, sorry .
I am not mad keen on his hair either, but thought it was better than the really short cut last season.

I am not sure I really get Brigitte's motivation to go back to politics - was she really that shook up by the idea that LoverBoy may not be allowed to enter Denmark under the proposed new legislation?? What's his name - Jeremy?

And isn't her English good?! Better than my Danish, anyway...

LOL! I'm back but was working till late. Will read and post tomorrow!

Doctrine, I had the same reaction to you about Gravity. On balance, the fact that she is so much the star and that she saves herself made me really like it. Plus, it wasn't too long. I have a weak girly brain and can't concentrate on sciencey things for too long.

GRAVITY - SPOILERS - DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT YET SEEN THIS ACE FILM

kickassangel, I agree. When she was first floating about in vest and pants I thought, "gratuitous?" and then I forgot about it because a lot of what was going on with her, and her body, was incredibly intimate, but not sexual or lascivious. It was like being her, not like perving on her. The panting, the grunting, the panicking, the tears, the drop of blood from a cut - it was all about her body but not in a creepy voyeuristic way.

When she heaved herself up from the mud at the end I felt the gravity and the slime like she did. If that film had been made in 1962 it would have been "pretty girl wavers delicately about with artful smears of mud on her delicate frame". At that point, I felt her bigness, her muscliness and her weight and I thought it was great, and of course, redeeeming (I know she doesn't have an ounce of fat - but they didn't try to make her look petite or exquisite)

continuing the spoilers

I just thought it was an unnecessary bit of inaccuracy and it really jarred and made me think "what was the motivation for that?" Maybe it was to make the final scene more majestic, then.

I had no idea how realistic it was and I did think it was about her body surviving. Also the camera didn't stay on any particular part if her body rather than another. The ending was almost about the rebirth of humanity, her finding life again after being emotionally dead. She was rising from the earth and sea to have a future.

yes, exactly

getting a bit annoyed on a bf-ing thread.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/breast_and_bottle_feeding/1916608-bf-ing-do-you-think-it-is-in-itself-tiring-more-than-just-having-a-baby-would-be

This stuck out to me

"The problem is if we highlight these things is may put people off BF"

but didn't seem to, to anyone else.

I am perhaps over sensitive but I feel like these days I am constantly running into little reminders that mothers don't matter, relative to their children. I think I may just be having some sort of reaction to coming out of the baby years. I think I maybe am feeling all the things I didn't allow myself to feel when I wouldn't contemplate giving formula, when they were too young to sleep-train, etc

Gah, I loved breastfeeding and think it is great and should be supported/encouraged but I am SO AGAINST this idea that we should pretend breastfeeding is all lovely and wonderful and never ever hard or people might not want to do it

Formula is a perfectly safe choice in this country. Yes, it's biologically inferior, yes it's over-pushed, and the manufacturers are dicks a lot of the time, but it's not that big of a deal. I would so so so much rather see mothers supported to breastfeed, honesty about formula, about breastfeeding, with no sugar-coating on either side, well-researched baby formula which is not produced for massive profit and charged a reasonable price for (I don't know what the actual cost of production is but sources I have seen suggest that the price of a tin is vastly inflated from the cost of making that one tin, and most of this money is needed to sustain advertising campaigns.) Let's, you know, let people make a choice instead of making it into a patronising spiel about "Breast is best!" and fuelling some ridiculous "war" between BF and FF mothers.

Things are just so horrendously intense in that first year with your first (and potentially, I imagine, if you have several in close succession) that you really do lose track of the bigger picture. I see women on facebook pages posting sadfaces about how somebody they know gave formula from newborn - seriously WHO CARES? And yet I know I was probably as insufferable at the time because you just can't see past the all-encompassing BABIES BABIES BABIES, THIS IS MY ENTIRE IDENTITY and how every choice is some kind of "statement" about whether you're "AP" or not and it's just so awfully tiresome and ridiculous when you're out of it.

I didn't see the thread before - I might pop over

I actually think it's pretty silly though - someone gets an idea in their head of what "AP" is supposed to be and it turns into some big war about "mainstream" and "AP" and it's only when your kids are older and you can look back and say, okay, I never sleep-trained or I never co-slept or whatever, but we all want the same things for our children ultimately and nobody is exclusively in any "camp" and most people do the exact same things with a slightly different slant, because, you know, we do that with everything in our entire lives.

I did see a horrible pernicious article along those lines the other day though and it ended with the lovely line "Feminism is all well and good but I'd rather be happy" (or something like that.) FFS, way to miss the point!!

I'll try to find it, was on facebook.

I think the trouble is, our society doesn't support the mothers (parents, but especially mothers in the early years when they're getting over pregnancies and may be bf) while they support the children. In a culture where it's normal to look after mothers of small children (however they're fed) mothers wouldn't feel so squeezed.

For me that culture would include expecting and facilitating mothers of babies to nap, to need nutritious food and extra domestic help, very flexible working where it'd be no business risk to eg explain to clients that other team members were taking over for a while because my child is going through teething or separation anxiety for a few weeks. It'd include non-parents having an awareness of the needs of young children - and feeling a collective responsibility for their wellbeing so that eg colleagues don't slag off parents leaving on time for bath time or wfh so to do the school run etc. Secure protected tenancies & social housing so that families of small children could live on 2 PT wages (and for 2 PT to be the norm).

Definitely Mavis! And I totally agree that a lot of things which are considered "normal" for new mums, like loss of sex drive, extreme tiredness, "baby brain", loneliness, depression - they are in almost all cases a perfectly natural and appropriate reaction to the circumstance and could be avoided if proper support was actually in place.

mavisg, that post makes me feel all tearful. I can't imagine those things, and trying makes me well up
I feel so alone at times. I am not alone, and I have dp, and I have good workmates but sometimes still it feels so overwhelmingly alone as if it is just me any my exhausted crappy body against - what...? I have this panicky fear that something is going to go really wrong

It's a false dichotomy again - the idea that the competition is between the mother and the baby - but they both need more, they both need the nutrition in every sense, and it needs to come from somewhere else, not a squabble between the two

I guess that is the problem with the vision of bfing as this magic independent empowering food source - it comes from somewhere, at someone's expense

I'm sorry Mildred, I didn't realise you were struggling at the moment :( I'm afraid I've just posted a mammoth post on the other thread which is more dispassionate and taking the emotion out but I'm not sure it's come across as what I said above, here, about it being a choice which we can enable but also making other choices acceptable too.

Oh no not really Berstie, don't worry
I am certainly not struggling with bfing - which I stopped over a year ago!

I think that I do tend to process things very late though,
the age gap between mine was such that I was either pg or bf-ing or both for something like 4 years continuously and I was quite a mess for quite a lot of that and had a very "never say die" attitude to it all, esp. with respect to work, and my mum, and dp, and it is kind of somehow catching up with me late that this is a marathon, not a sprint, really (very obvious but I am slow to catch on)

anyway the "being paid to breastfeed" brought all this to the fore for me (emotionally) and certain people always being so relentlessly gung ho and jolly hockey sticks just make me feel so wet

Did you read Zoe Williams on childcare in the guardian?

I don't think so - I have to make dinner now, but I'll come back :)

Oh Mildred I have soooo been there and I feel for you deeply.

You're right, the mother's and children's interests coincide, it's only under (unnatural) stress that they (are forced to) compete.

I hope you can find ways to coddle yourself wherever possible so that you can feel better. Things that help me are positive reframing of stuff eg recapturing the triumph of having been up all night when that meant pills & dancing and (trying to) apply it to baby wakings, remembering/trusting that things will keep getting easier (I know teenagers need a lot too but I'll feel a whole lot more ready to give it when mine's the only bum I have to wipe). A little exercise when I can (walking plus the odd yoga pose atm as baby having hard time w teeth), eating as well yet as easily as I can (I put cheese & the salad drawer of the fridge on the table & announce 'Dinner' with conviction) & postponing work-related stress where I can (I am not Leaning In, nor will I for some time. Something has to give.) Making my bed as comfy as possible, snacks, kindle, netflix for night cryings (baby's, not mine, not atm). Being kind to my husband across an abyss of whatever the opposite of intimacy is. And remembering that it isn't some failing of mine that makes it this hard. It's living 250 miles from family and having a support network of other knackered parents locally - love 'em but they can't physically help us! And that this hard bit will pass, and that I choose to make some bits harder (the 'AP' stuff) and own those choices. And that things will get easier. Did I say that already?

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/19/childcare-much-more-than-economics

"It's not always about being economically productive" basically

v slow, x posted.

You are not wet. You have some sort of ptsd after a lengthy and arduous ordeal that's bizarrely invisible to most people.

mildred, I too have been there and every word you write chimes with me. Particlularly the point you made about how because BFing is something only the mother can do, suddenly everything to do with the baby automatically becomes 'mother's problem' .
Berstie you are so v right too.

I admire the fact that you both have the energy and patience to put all this in writing - I just CBA

I last BF over 2 years ago so am not acutely traumatised by it, but OMG - I did not like it, but very much wanted to do it, so did.
Tiktok most certainly saved my BFing 'career' with DS3 when things did not go well (this is how I found MN), but I am not sure that I agree with everything she writes wrt strategy etc. I have an interest in infant feeding in my professional life and am hoping to liaise with our local BFing support to set up a 'Feeding ?Café ?Support ?Chat and eat ' as soon as we have the space at work.
I don't think that there needs to be any debate about whether or not BFing/Bmilk benefits the baby (of course it dose), but not at all cost. I would like to get fathers, childcarers, grandparents involved.
I still hear so much shite spouted about BFing at the same time I don't think it is always easy and just because it's 'natural' does not mean that it 'comes natural' IYKWIM.
FFing has been the norm since after the 2nd WW and it's hard to do something not-normal when those around you disapprove or want to 'help' when the going is tough by suggesting FF.

Ah, see now I am ranting after all - and my thoughts are not at all as thought out and sensible as mildred's

Not at all - love to see more thoughts on the situation!

I think I am taking for granted that we all understand what is good about bf-ing. I loved not having to make bottles, especially at night. I loved not having to make decisions, because with ebf whatever is going on you just offer breast and let the baby decide what to do. Sore throat, heatwave, anything - you dont have to change anything you just keep offering - nice and simple. I liked (sorry to say this, it might offend some but I am being brutally honest) that it was the "right" thing to do and that made me feel better about all the things I was terrible at. I loved that I didn't have to pay for anything or carry anything and I never had to have an argument about it with anyone in my family or anything like that. So there is a lot of stuff that is just great.
I will never know if what wiped me out was anything to do with bf-ing or not and what was said so eloquently about support for mothers in general by MavisG is perhaps all that is needed here. but I think that "yay bf is unmitigatedly great!" places too high expectations on ourselves, by ourselves.

Similarly - I think I posted this before - the way it would be kind to treat a person when peri-natal and as a mother of small children - as someone who should be offered seats, first access to food and drink and is basically physically extremely flaky (at least I am after all the spd and tiredness) - is the way traditional manners imply all weak and delicate ladies should be treated. I know we all want to say nowadays we are not weak and delicate but when you think that a few generations ago women commonly had 8 or 10 children and were sort of peri-natal for 20 years after which they were probably old and worn out, it seems logical that you would always get up and give them your seat and then present them with a plate of biscuits pronto because aint no way they are going to hustle to the front of the biscuit-queue by natural quickness and get-up-and-go

I suppose I am just weary of having to pretend that everything is great and I am strong as if that is the sine qua non of feminism. Celebrating wimmin & shit.

MavisG, I x-posted with your brilliant post of 15.47 yesterday and have just seen it. It's ace! Thanks