#times up
Winfrey Portman 2020
make it happen people
Credit:George McCalman
Ava DuVernay is a force in Hollywood, having made a name for herself not only as a director, producer and screenwriter, but as a champion of change. Now, more than ever, media representations that we see daily in print, on television, and in films are being called into question. But, for the past decade, Ava DuVernay’s mission has been to push for more inclusivity on sets and on screen. “Diversity is not just a box to check. It’s a reality that should be deeply felt and held and valued by all of us,” DuVernay said in an interview with Fast Company.
How did DuVernay become a Hollywood game changer?
Her story isn’t a straight line — it’s a series of pivots based on strong determination and the willingness to take chances to forge her own path. Born in Long Beach, California, DuVernay was raised in a matriarchal environment with lots of women who always encouraged her to follow her heart. She grew up near the Compton neighborhood of Los Angeles and was the first African American student body president at her high school. Film wasn’t her dream from the get-go. As an undergrad at UCLA, she pursued a major in African American studies, then shifted into the world of public relations after spending time as a journalist.
Ava DuVernay gave the commencement speech at the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television in 2017. Photo credit: UCLA
At 27, she started her own public relations firm, The DuVernay Agency. As a film publicist, she was able to get close to different filmmakers, seeing how movies were made firsthand. This proximity to the world of film enamored her. While on a film set in East Los Angeles for the 2004 crime thriller, “Collateral,” DuVernay had an aha! moment when she realized that she wanted to be the one telling the stories, the one making the movies. “Javier Bardem was on set, and something about the scene with Javier and Jamie, this brown man and this black man: It was this gritty place in East L.A. at night, with a digital camera, and I just loved it,” she shared with Rolling Stone. “I started writing a script that weekend.“
In 2011, she self-financed “I Will Follow,” her first feature film she wrote and directed, after a few years of learning the film trade while working on shorts and documentaries. Just three years later, she directed the acclaimed “Selma,” a film about Martin Luther King Jr. and the 1965 Selma to Montgomery march. Following the release of “Selma,”DuVernay was the first African American female director to be nominated for an Academy Award for best picture. With the upcoming release of “A Wrinkle in Time,” boasting a budget exceeding $100 million, DuVernay is now the first African American woman to direct a live-action film with a budget of that size.
Ava DuVernay on her journey to become the first black woman to direct an Oscar nominated film. Credit: TIME
Beyond her notable accomplishments and series of “firsts,” she’s hoping to create a larger shift in Hollywood, one with varied voices and stories in cinema. Just three years ago, she expanded her film distribution company to become ARRAY, where female filmmakers and people of color are at the forefront. “It comes down to who gets to tell the story? If the dominant images that we have seen throughout our lifetime, our mother’s lifetime, our grandmother’s lifetime, have been dominated by one kind of person, and we take that, we internalize it, we drink it in as true, as fact. It’s tragic,” DuVernay wrote in Timemagazine. “It goes beyond the film industry. These are the images of ourselves we consume. It affects the way we see ourselves and the way other people see us.”
The world of film in the United States has been built and defined by the predominately white patriarchy. But with her courageous streak and fearless creativity, DuVernay is opening doors for women, people of color and those who have been underrepresented in the film industry for so long. By advocating for a diverse set of at least 50 percent people of color and women, DuVernay has put her own politics in action: “Inclusion is really half — half of the cast, half of the directors, half of the writers are women or girls, half of the room, more than half of the room is of color,” she shared with Ellemagazine. “I think we get really satisfied with less.” And she’s just getting started. For “A Wrinkle in Time,” DuVernay warned the each of the department heads on her crew not to submit the same list of hires unless they could prove they had considered others. In making inclusion a key nonnegotiable in her creative process, DuVernay is changing the narrative for how stories are told and who gets to tell them.
Girls are encouraged to learn to defend themselves these day because of all those boys getting away with rape because “One little mistake shouldn’t ruin his life.” Girls have always fought, but now girls are trained in combat and boys are stellar at first person shooters.
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Excerpted from Audre Lorde’s paper “The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action,” originally delivered at the Lesbian and Literature panel of the Modern Language Association’s December 28, 1977 meeting. First published in Sinister Wisdom 6andThe Cancer Journals.
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Recently, I led a discussion on intersectional issues of abuse including systemic issues of sexismandrape culture, and ended with encouraging my support group leadership, participants, and loved ones to confront, disrupt, and eradicate these issues with a goal of helping establish empathic environments free of shame, stigma, and fear in our homes, schools, and workplaces. It was met with cathartic feedback; one survivor’s response hit home. I’m sharing bits and bytes from the presentation here.
It’s accurate to state that the majority of our country is aware of sexism and ignorant to rape culture and its direct linkage to sexism: that everyday rape culture is protected and promulgated in every aspect of our lives through sexist verbiageandpolicy; the promotion of sexual coercion;lack of bodily autonomy; and disregard for feminine-presenting or gender-nonconforming people. Rape culture can be subtle or overt; often, abusers consciously create situations with subtleties so that when called out, they have a litany of excuses—“gray areas,” they may say—ready to escape culpability.
“There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle, because we do not live single-issue lives.”
Audre Lorde in “Learning from the ‘60s,” in Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches.
All people have the right to engage with their social, academic, and professional spaces free from harmful behavior. Education on how to give and get consent in daily interactions is critically important to creating sustainable culture change. Coercive behavior at home, school, and work can include intimidation, subtle or overt threats, blackmail, dishonesty, and gaslighting, often romanticized. Eventually due to unyielding pressure, the victim may acquiesce, sustaining the false notion of a mutual agreement.
A person’s ability to consent is influenced by the interplay of power, identity, and privilege. In using coercion, an abuser in a position of power—perceived or actual—leverages that power to achieve their desired outcome which can include subjugation, humiliation, and sexual control. An abuser with power and privilege is responsible for not putting a person in a position where they are expected to say yes. Rape culture normalizes the belief that a yes achieved through coercion is sufficient consent, allowing for collective disregard of a victim’s personhood and value.
Example 1:
Abuser creates false sense of safety for victim; abuser intimidates victim with falsehoods that victim will later debunk; abuser silences victim with threats; abuser subtly and overtly abuses victim with others’ knowledge; victim calls out abuser for abuse and debunked falsehoods; abuser gaslights victim with discriminatory verbiage; victim struggles with debilitating anxiety and depression.
When victim discloses details to their support system, half of said support system responds with: “He denied it”and“Don’t think about it.”
Example 2:
On June 10, 2019, the Washington Postreported, “President Trump’s pitter-patter of exaggerated numbers, unwarranted boasting and outright falsehoods has continued at a remarkable pace. As of June 7, his 869th day in office, the president has made 10,796 false or misleading claims.”
“He’s denied it. That’s all I need to hear.” —Senator Lindsay Graham, regarding the rape charges that EllecolumnistE. Jean Carroll made against Trump on June 21, 2019.
Often when victims share their abuse—whether in pieces and on their time or full force and immediately—they are labeled and further shamed and stigmatized. When victims are advised to trivialize, divert, and ignore their abuse, they are further intimidated and silenced. Society is infinitely creative in dismissing victims’ abuse, particularly the experiences of victims whose identities are on the margins of mainstream culture. As such, a victim—survivor—who has experienced abuse, and whose identity is on the margins of mainstream culture, is more likely to face additional barriers to disclosing, reporting, seeking lifesaving care, and justice.
So how do we move forward? First, institutions and the justice system must stop protecting and perpetuating victim blaming and gender inequity, including hegemonic masculinityandpatriarchy. All of this is part of rape culture. Victims must be empowered with the support that they need to survive and thrive; as such, they should be viewed as survivors. We must remember that credibility is a basic survival tool,and that survivors speaking up is courageous. Speaking up often comes at a price, whether at the expense of a survivor’s reputation, education, career, and/or health. We must work to confront, disrupt, and eradicate that expense.
Parents, leadership in schools and workplaces, and policy makers must teach and communicate prevention, engagement, and outreach regarding gender equity, violence prevention, and trauma. This is critically important to developing concrete strategies grounded in theoretical framework.
Finally, it is utmost important that survivors are supported. Responding to a survivor’s disclosure with compassion, validation, and support is critically important for a survivor healing from abuse and trauma. Supporting survivors confronts pervasive attitudes that cast doubts on survivors who come forward; as such, support is integral to preventing future incidents of abuse. Validation and support sends a message to society that these types of abusive behavior are harmful and must have consequences.
Survivor healing and abuser accountability are both utmost important to survivors finding closure and emerging with growth and resilience. Often, a survivor cannot move onward without it.
Survivors of sexual harassment, sexual misconduct, sexual assault, and rape often relive trauma again and again to prove that they’re traumatized in order to establish credibility with institutional powers and the justice system. Invasive ordeals compound the subjugation and humiliation experienced; all of this is necessary, survivors are told, for accountability and justice. Survivors are expected to behave, respect, remember, grieve, stay focused and maintain work ethic, suppress anguish, be strong, and divulge excruciating moments to strangers. Bearing witness to these details should only be accessed at the survivor’s will, on their time, and on their public or private terms at which point divulgence to their chosen person(s) can be an act of catharsis and empowerment for the survivor.
A year and a half ago, I vowed to myself to help other women and minorities access expert compassionate care; to heal and never lose faith in the beautiful collective humanity that I know exists; to go forth with confidence and strengthened dedication to well-being; for trauma to serve as a model of human insight; and for survivorship to serve as a conduit to empathy and expertise. I’ve since learned and unlearned: writing, as it once was, is still my catharsis and light and being; vulnerability is courageous and opening oneself up to another human is an act of resilience; post-trauma’s effects can easily be reignited with fresh trauma; survival may be dependent upon continually seeking care; and openly discussing anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues is the most powerful way to break down stigma.
I write for every woman who wishes to write, who has spoken truth to power that protects and perpetuates gender-based discrimination, gender-based violence, sexual harassment, sexual misconduct, sexual assault, and rape. I write for every woman who wishes to write, who has been met with sexist and tired statements including and not limited to, “He’s a good guy” and “He’s talented,” as if talent (and often, statistically unsupported overconfidence), “niceness,” and bro culture that both men and women protect and perpetuate, somehow excuses the behavior and/or crime, and discomfort, anxiety, and depression that the woman endured. I write for every woman who wishes to write, who has endured gaslighting,victim blaming, shaming, stigma, and judgment.
“Being told that, categorically, he knows what he’s talking about and she doesn’t, however minor a part of any given conversation, perpetuates the ugliness of this world and holds back its light. After my book Wanderlust came out in 2000, I found myself better able to resist being bullied out of my own perceptions and interpretations. On two occasions around that time, I objected to the behavior of a man, only to be told that the incidents hadn’t happened at all as I said, that I was subjective, delusional, overwrought, dishonest—in a nutshell, female.”
Excerpted from Men Explain Things to Me, by Rebecca Solnit.
“When I sat down and wrote the essay Men Explain Things to Me, here’s what surprised me: though I began with a ridiculous example of being patronized by a man, I ended with rapes and murders. We tend to treat violence and the abuse of power as though they fit into airtight categories: harassment, intimidation, threat, battery, rape, murder. But I realize now that what I was saying is: it’s a slippery slope. That’s why we need to address that slope, rather than compartmentalizing the varieties of misogyny and dealing with each separately. Doing so has meant fragmenting the picture, seeing the parts, not the whole.
A man acts on the belief that you have no right to speak and that you don’t get to define what’s going on. That could just mean cutting you off at the dinner table or the conference. It could also mean telling you to shut up, or threatening you if you open your mouth, or beating you for speaking, or killing you to silence you forever. He could be your husband, your father, your boss or editor, or the stranger at some meeting or on the train, or the guy you’ve never seen who’s mad at someone else but thinks ‘women’ is a small enough category that you can stand in for ‘her.’ He’s there to tell you that you have no rights.
Threats often precede acts, which is why the targets of online rape and death threats take them seriously, even though the sites that allow them and the law enforcement officials that generally ignore them apparently do not. Quite a lot of women are murdered after leaving a boyfriend or husband who believes he owns her and that she has no right to self-determination.”
Rebecca Solnit on why #YesAllWomen matters, and why phrases like domestic violence, mansplaining, rape culture, and sexual entitlement help us address issues honestly and open the way to change.
Note that academic institutions and the justice system have historically protected classism, white supremacy, and patriarchy. Note the published phrases used to describe Brock Turner, the man who sexually assaulted Chanel Miller: “baby-faced Stanford freshman,” “All-American swimmer,” “Stanford swimmer,” and winning swimming times were promulgated by journalists to uphold Turner’s privilege and Stanford’s reputation.
Millions of women of Asian descent are bearing witness to Chanel MillerandRowena Chiu claiming their names and taking control of their narratives. The catharsis that I feel as a woman, of Asian descent, and survivor is liberating and I know that it is resonating with other women of color. It is critically important to note that women, both cis- and transgender, are disproportionately affected by sexual violence, and that while the majority of sexual assaults and rapes in America are reported by white women, women of color especially Black women and Native American women are more likely to be sexually assaulted and raped. It is equally important to note that Asian women report rape and other forms of sexual violence less frequently than women of other races.
Asian women experience and intersect with racism, sexism, and misogyny in ways that are shared with women of other races and separately, unique to us. Everyone must acknowledge the dehumanization of Asian women—including hyper sexualization and fetishization—and acknowledge its unequivocal link to American colonialism, imperialism, and militarization in Asian countries. Asian women and all women of color are often asked, “Why didn’t you report it?” The obvious reasons include trauma; lack of financial resources; immigration status; mistrust of the justice system; and shame, societal- and self-stigma, and risk of alienation from families, friends, and ethnic communities.
The data on underreporting and shame, stigma, and fear associated with victim self-reporting is unequivocally linked to the data that three out of four sexual assaults are not reported to law enforcement. I personally do not believe that incarceration is synonymous with justice; nonetheless, the data is jarring: five out of every 1,000 perpetrators receive prison sentencing. All of this is evidence that survivors of sexual harassment, sexual misconduct, sexual assault, and rape—especially those from marginalized groups—can fail to receive justice from a system that is biased against them from the start. Half of survivors who report their sexual assaults and rapes say that they are re-traumatized by law enforcement, which may blame them for their own assaults and rapes.
So how do we move forward? First, we must support both cis- and transgender women, other marginalized groups, and survivors of all genders. Recognize whether there is a tendency to victim-blame, and listen to survivors of all intersecting identities whether they choose to publicly or privately disclose details of their traumas. Identify responsibilities—as a professional, as a human—and support survivors by working to eradicate systemic issues of harmful masculine idealsandrape culture. Understand that yes, all sexism is linked to rape culture; work to confront, disrupt, and eradicate issues of sexism at its rearing. Support community health centersandPlanned Parenthood centers, where low-income women and minorities will be treated with expert compassionate care.Support public libraries and access to computers, free Internet, and digital literacy tools. Know that these tools are intrinsically linked to audibility and survival.
To my support network: I love you and am grateful for your love and support these past years. You remember when I was confident, uninhibited, and assertive; when I lost that for some time; and my re-emergence, grown, growing, and resilient.
I recognize my privilege and know that many survivors are struggling with alienation from family and friends and may be unsure where to seek support. Please find verified resources below:
BetterBrave is a guide to identifying and addressing sexual harassment.
The Center for Changing Our Campus Culture is an online resource to address dating violence, intimate partner violence, and sexual assault, supported by the Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women.
Local domestic violence shelters resource guide
Equal Rights Advocates is a nonprofit legal organization dedicated to protecting and expanding economic and educational access and opportunities for women.
Me Too is a movement that supports survivors of sexual violence and their allies by connecting survivors to healing resources, and offering community organizing resources, information regarding pursuing a “me too” policy platform, and sexual violence research.
The National Domestic Violence Hotline provides lifesaving tools and immediate support to enable victims to find safety.
The National Women’s Law Center works to protect and advance the progress of women and girls at work and in school, with special attention given to the needs of low-income women and families.
Rise is a multi-sector coalition of sexual assault survivors and allies working to empower all survivors with civil rights and in 2016, drafted and passed the Sexual Assault Survivors’ Bill of Rights unanimously through Congress.
The TIME’S UP Legal Defense Fund supports the brave individuals who have come forward, at great risk to themselves, to seek the justice they deserve and to protect others from similar behavior. It is administered by the National Women’s Law Center.
This blog started on February 17th, 2015. Long before Russiagate, long before #metoo, long before Biden announced his candidacy. Four months before Trump announced he was running for President.
The author of the Violence Against Women Act cannot keep his hands off women. Everyone knows this. We are just.here to document
Nothing becomes disinformation by being labelled so. Show your work.
in Solidarity with Clinic Defense and World Naked Bike Ride
Part Two Starts: Gathering 5:30 PM
A joyous and liberating protest aimed at reducing the dangers posed to our world and our bodies by automobiles and oil dependence! The ride takes place in solidarity with the World Naked Bike Ride, in its 10th year internationally, with rides happening across the Northern Hemisphere on this date. While the ride is clothing optional, many will be clothed yet still ready to celebrate body autonomy in any way they see fit. Feel free to come as dressed or bare as you dare. Creative costuming is also highly encouraged. Body painting and bike decoration will start at 5:30 PM, with the ride departing no later than 6:30pm. Activists will provide a know your rights training and teach-inn on consent. Be sure to bring lights, bells, a sense of humor , a positive attitude, and respect for all riders.
Reclaim your body! Reclaim your streets! Reclaim your planet! Ride your bike! The Body Autonomy Ride is a safer space for all bodies to ride free of harassment or pollutants in the physical or mental environment. To participate each rider is asked to respect that the liberation of bodies requires freedom, autonomy, and justice for all. This begins with joy and commitment to self determination for all.
http://times-up.org/index.php?page=safer-spaces-policy
For scenes from Previous Rides:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlJKt8Etu64
Bebe Rexha talks about women in the music business and how we should support each other instead of competing with each other ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
