tiegan lucy: education

After reading Lauren's first book 'What would the Spice Girls do?' I deeply and all at once fell in love with her writing. Immediately after reading her book I started following her on Instagram, which is where I learned she had decided to give up fast fashion. I was interested in her decision to do this in today's society where influencer culture and clothing in the media is more dominating than ever before – especially for young women of her age. It didn’t come as a surprise to me (but a great excitement nonetheless) when she announced she was writing and releasing her newest book ‘How to Break Up with Fast Fashion’. I didn’t hesitate to pre-order it and began counting down the days until I could absorb all her reasoning and research behind the huge lifestyle change that she’d undertaken.

In the anticipation of this book, I became slightly worried. I was worried that as Lauren’s Instagram stories all seemed to be her in beautiful preowned clothing, or her seeming to constantly be in local charity shops in London, that the book would be strict and take a ‘holier-than-thou’ approach. I was worried that stepping away from fast fashion just wouldn’t be something I could do successfully and that by reading the book I would feel like an awful person - because just think of the helpless poverty-ridden children and the poor planet I’m destroying, HOW COULD I BE SO SELFISH!. Thankfully, (and I should’ve known this by how kind and approachable Lauren has been on direct messages to me), the book followed the same nature as her; understanding, informative, light-hearted and comical. It teaches you how to make you love your own wardrobe, how to get stains out of clothes you own instead of binning them, and how to mend broken items without replacing them. And it doesn't fall short of a pop culture reference or a Friends quote here and there.

The aspect I love most of all about this book is that it manages to have the tone of education and explanation, but without feeling like an essential university reading that you can’t wait to be over. It can be enlightening without feeling like an elderly grandparent going on at you about how much more sustainable they were at your age… *insert ‘back in my day’ quote here*. It doesn’t feel like a pestering ringing in your ears telling you how you are singlehandedly killing polar bears and should be ashamed of yourself. Instead, it tells us why we are all terrible (but in a nice way). Lauren admits to her own flaws in terms of sustainability and tells of how her old self used fast fashion as a way to make herself feel better, but actually, it ended up making herself feel worse. Ring any bells? I certainly relate.

Lauren has helped me realise small things I can do to become more sustainable around clothing. I’m not going to go out and suddenly buy all my clothes from charity shops, but I will gradually change my lifestyle to benefit the world around me. I’ll wash my clothes at 30 degrees or below because that’s all they need. I’ll continue to donate my used clothes to charity shops, and if they don’t accept them, I’ll recycle them. I’ll stop buying as many new clothing items as I have in the past (it’ll help the bank out too). Instead of spending hours trawling through ASOS or PLT, maybe I’ll take a look at a sustainable fashion website.

Overall, Lauren’s book has taught me so many little ways I can improve my shopping habits, without having to go cold turkey on buying clothes. If you want to learn more about the fast fashion industry, its negative implications, and how to stop it creating the huge clothing waste problem that it is, then READ LAUREN’S BOOK. Also, if you’re curious as to how sustainable you currently are, you should follow this link and take the quiz. This could be a useful way to track your improvement if you take any of Lauren’s advice https://www.thredup.com/fashionfootprint/. And remember: if you wouldn't wear it thirty times, or can't think of at least three things you already own that you could wear with it, don't buy it.

January 20, 2020 No comments

Last week I absolutely devoured Tara Westover’s memoir ‘Educated’. I’m not at all shocked that it’s an International Bestseller and one of Obama’s favourite books of 2018.

In a small valley in Idaho, Tara Westover was the youngest of seven children living on her fathers scrap-yard. The main oddity within her life was that legally she did not exist. Due to her parent's Mormon extremism, she had no birth certificate, no school records and no medical records or insurance. Her parents were persistent in living a life free from any reliance on the state or federal government. This was because her father was aiming to make the family self-sufficient in preparation for The End of Days (which he at one point believed to be Y2K).

Tara, who had no real birthday as her family could not remember the exact day, went through a traumatic and scarring childhood. Due to their lack of health insurance, combined with the nature of her fathers work on a scrap-yard, the Westover family went through many distressing injuries, including third-degree burns on her brother’s legs and slight brain damage to her mother after a car accident caused by Tara’s father. The way Tara’s father treated his children made me furious and I was in disbelief that he allowed it to happen. As Tara’s mother was a herbalist; who eventually created a very successful essential oil business, she would ‘heal’ herself and the family with her homoeopathy.

Alongside her already distressing upbringing, Tara was also subject to physical and emotional abuse from one of her older brothers. He was manipulative towards her and caused her intense pain; meanwhile, her parents never did anything to stop him. Eventually, enough was enough and another of her brothers convinced her she should try and pass her exams to get into BYU (a Mormon university), which is where he had studied. Her parents weren’t happy but allowed her to go. It was here that she properly began her journey with education. I was thrilled to read she was finally leaving her destructive home.

In Tara’s first few days at BYU, she was appalled by the other Mormon girls in her room wearing short-sleeved tops, drinking Diet Coke and doing homework on Sunday’s. This was not how she had been taught to behave in the eyes of God. This made her feel complete unease and resentment towards the girls. She eventually realised that not all Mormons were extremists like her parents and began to learn about the nature of the real world. She had been desensitised to how her family treated her at home. Her naivety shines through to others when she is blissfully unaware of common historical events such as the Holocaust. Due to her determination, but not without some slumps and breakdowns along the way, she ends up at Cambridge University and then completes a PhD at Harvard University.

Much to my disappointment, she goes back home to visit her family many times throughout these years in the hope that they’ve changed and will accept her when she explains her brother's abuse towards her. She experiences absolute betrayal from her family members and her father says he will only forgive her if she agrees to be given a blessing by him. Her increased sense of self-worth meant that she rejected this offer and has since not spoken to her family. She realises during her education that her dad is bi-polar and it helps explain to her his attitude towards religion and authority.

This memoir sent me on a rollercoaster of emotions. I was rooting for Tara’s independence from her family from the first page. She explains such a complicated attachment to the people she thought wanted to protect her, but in reality, only damaged her. I was distraught, I was enraged, I was hopeful, I was disheartened and then I was content. Her story felt fictitious and I was in a constant state of perplexity. It is an inspirational story about how getting an education changed her life.

‘There was a moment that winter. I was kneeling on the carpet, listening to Dad testify of Mother’s calling as a healer, when my breath caught in my chest and I felt taken out of myself. I no longer saw my parents or our living room. What I saw was a woman grown, with her own mind, her own prayers, who no longer sat, childlike, at her father’s feet.’ - Tara Westover

September 09, 2019 No comments

Unless you lived under a rock for the entirety of the noughties, you’ll know that Legally Blonde is a chick flick that was released in November 2001. It was directed by Robert Luketic and is based on a novel written by Amanda Brown. The story goes that Elle Woods (played by the iconic Reece Witherspoon) wants nothing more than to be Mrs Warner Huntington III, but she is labelled by him as being ’too blonde’. Elle then rallies all of her gal pals and resources to wrangle herself a place at Harvard Law School, in the hope of winning him back.

As a disclaimer, I love this film and have watched it more times than I care to admit. But is this empowering film really as feminist as it looks on the surface? The women in Legally Blonde are shown to be only interested in fashion, make-up and male partners unless they are ‘boring, ugly and serious’ and then, in that case, they can pursue a ‘male career’. Women are seen as unable and unlikely to get into serious careers if they also have an interest in their own appearance. Can women not be simultaneously attractive and ambitious?

In one scene, Elle’s parents don’t fully support her decision to go into a job field that is primarily male as it’s ‘boring, ugly and serious’ which is unlike her. They don’t believe she should have to go out into the world and strive for intelligence. This shows gender stereotyping of jobs and women having to fight for the same education quality as men. It also promotes that Elle is only going through with education in law to win the attention of a man. Her prior qualification is that she got a 4.0 in Fashion Merchandising which can be seen as a ‘girly’ degree major and bears little importance and relevance to what would be considered a ‘serious career’. I’m sure none of us ladies in 2019 are going through university for a man's approval, and besides, the fashion industry is a prestigious job sector to work in.

In her college video application, Elle is in swimwear being very girly and overly sexualised. She mentions a ‘very important issue’ which is then revealed to be switching the brand of toilet paper in her sorority. She claims that she ‘pays attention to important details’ which is then revealed to be what happened on the programme ‘Days of Our Lives’. She shouts ‘I Object’ to wolf-whistling and street harassment which is seen to be a normal daily occurrence for her. This shows a gender norm of women being sexually harassed as a standard part of day to day life. It also implies that, to women, ‘important’ parts of life are not really important at all. ‘Sexualisation is the standard for female characters globally: girls and women are twice as likely as boys and men to be shown in sexually revealing clothing, partially or fully naked, thin, and five times as likely to be referenced as attractive.’ (UN Women, 2014).

However, the main point of the film is that she ends up with a law degree in the end which I’d say gives the feminist nature of the film a leg to stand on. It doesn’t take a genius to notice that law is a male-dominated profession. ‘Over a third of the partners in mid-size firms are female (37%) and this has grown from 31% in 2014.’ (Sra.org.uk, 2017). This can be seen when Elle’s ex-boyfriend says she’s ‘Never going to get the grades to qualify for one of those spots’ and ‘You’re not smart enough sweetie’. This is patronising and shows society’s opinion on women attempting to get an education that competes with men. Elle raises the point that she got into the same law school and took the same LSATS and classes, but her ex still argues for her to ‘Be serious, you can do something more valuable with your time’.

Legally Blonde wins points for the feminist movement when Elle gets into law school, when she graduates with her law degree and DOESN’T go back to her ex, but instead finds a loving boyfriend, and when she befriends the girl who was mean to her at first (thumbs up for the sister solidarity). She also overcomes sexual harassment from her mentor and is honoured as valedictorian.

However, minus points for the feminist movement when Elle goes to get a law degree because a man said she should, and for all of Elle’s friends being portrayed as stupid for only being interested in fashion and make-up. It’s also worth noting that Elle Woods doesn’t acknowledge her privilege as a white, middle-class woman. It’s not just luck that she had all the resources she needed to get into law school. The film leaves out intersectionality for women who wouldn’t even get the opportunity to go to Harvard Law School due to lack of economic and educational capital. There is no representation of the struggles women of colour and lower classes face when trying to acquire a high-quality education.

Therefore, after all of this, can we still label Legally Blonde as a feminist film in 2019? I’d argue that the premise is very girl power heavy but the execution of Elle’s success could only ever happen and apply to a certain category of women.

Bibliography

Sra.org.uk. (2017). How diverse are law firms?. [online] Available at:
http://www.sra.org.uk/solicitors/diversity-toolkit/diverse-law-firms.page

UN Women. (2014). Geena Davis study press release. [online] Available at:
http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2014/9/geena-davis-study-press-release

August 31, 2019 1 comments

I can honestly say that reading this book was a pivotal moment in my life. It came through my door on an afternoon in February, the day it was published, which was coincidently World Book Day. I read it cover to cover that same afternoon. It was the first book I’d read of it’s kind and since that day my outlook on the whole grey area of Sex and Relationships Education has been changed forever. It was that day that I decided I wanted to strive to make a difference in this sector to help Sex Education be more inclusive and accessible to everyone. It’s a human right to understand our own bodies.

The Introduction and first chapter ‘A Sex Re-Education’ thoroughly shocked me and the cogs started turning. I was reminiscing my own Sex Education and realising that I was incorrect in thinking that due to being educated in the noughties that I’d be fully clued up on this topic. Surely in this day and age, I should’ve been taught all there is to know about my body? Right? Wrong.

There was so much information I had been deprived of. The Eve Appeal did a study in 2016 where 1,000 adult British women were asked to name female genitalia. Hundreds of them failed to the point where a staggering 60% were unable to identify their vulva. This statistic stuck out in my brain like a sore thumb and to this day I still haven’t been able to shake it. I was one of those women who couldn’t identify my own basic anatomy. I felt that I’d been done a massive disservice by the education system and by women-hood as a whole.

Sex education has not been working. Statistics back this statement up. As a society, we are too scared to teach people about one of the utmost important things to the human race. In science, sex is taught in terms of reproduction, purely to reproduce and create another generation. It’s a scientific approach. In PSHE it’s taught in terms of consent and safety. When will we teach teenagers about the pleasurable and fascinating side of our bodies? And what about the parts of the female body that aren’t directly for reproducing but still affect us on a monthly basis?

Lynn discusses in detail The Facts, The Hymen, The Clitoris, The Orgasm, Appearances, Periods, Pain, Fertility, Pregnancy and Menopause. So many of these essential topics are missing from the Sex Education curriculum, and there I could finally see it right in front of me. ‘The clitoris has been unmentioned, overlooked and deleted’ teachers won’t talk about it for fear of being inappropriate. Girls all over the world have their first period and don’t know what it is. Many women have never orgasmed. FGM (female genital mutilation) is more common than you’d like to believe. The hymen is seen as a symbol of virginity, but it’s not a ‘covering’ made to be broken on the first penetration. In fact, it’s not a covering at all. Women and men experience an ‘orgasm gap’ of 95% of straight men surveyed saying they usually always orgasm from sex compared to only 65% of straight women. The list of simple human biology we are unaware and uneducated about goes on and on.

I’ve learnt so much since picking this book up. I’ve now read an abundance of books about women’s health and I can confirm that women’s bodies are incredible. Reading this book has led me to become the Social Media Designer for my university’s Sexpression Society. I post on all our social platforms, educating about Sex and Relationships. We all deserve to know the truth about our bodies. I would recommend this book to anyone, men included, to educate yourself on the phenomenal things the female body can do.

And finally, food for thought, I’ll leave you with this: if you truly think that Sex Education has been equally based on women as it has on men, I challenge you to draw and label as many parts of the penis as you can. And then do this again for a vulva. I can assure you the results will be far from equal.

August 29, 2019 3 comments

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