By Sarah Joslyn {Before we start, I use the word “virgin” when talking about my lack of sexual experience. It is the word that was used to celebrate my body and also used to shame it. For the place and time I grew up, this is the language of familiarity. I now know “virgin” is a heteronormative, socially-defined term that turns persons… Read more →
By Hannah Renee Paasch Before I could even look at boys I was sneaking off to the romance novel section of my local Christian bookstore when my folks would stop in for commentaries or prayer journals. Janette Oke knew what was UP. Even as a kid I sensed that her wildly ahistorical plots—the battles, the cloak-and-dagger intrigues that somehow seemed to all… Read more →
By Jessica Newsome I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out what forgiveness means. To be honest, the word enrages me. When I grew up, forgiveness meant “restoration”—which frankly, meant abuse. It meant that church leaders who tried to cast demons out of my friends suffering from eating disorders were above reproach. It meant the church members who emotionally,… Read more →
By Jessica Knippel I’ve always been ambivalent about motherhood. Not in a militant, anti-patriarchal power dynamics sense, but in a much more subtle—and more personal—way. As a child I was raised with dolls and dreams of marriage, yet in spite of all the “babies” I didn’t really play at motherhood. More often my play was about creating things… Read more →
By Savannah Hattan [Content Note: rape, sexual assault] As I read the articles and commentary spattered across my newsfeed of Brock Turner, the rapist, I thought to myself, “Maybe it’s time to tell my story.” But I’ve always wondered what I have to say that no one else has said; probably nothing new. But as I did dishes, and cooked dinner, I… Read more →
By Hannah Renee Paasch It was a lazy, scorching summer day—the kind of day where you walk outside and just get assaulted by the dragon-level fire breath of an Arizona July—when I stormed onto a local Starbucks patio and said the last words I would ever say to my ex-boyfriend. I was overcome with a sense of personal pride… Read more →
As a part of our interview series, Flawless Project contributor Jessica Newsome has been asking flawless women in different fields and life places seven questions about life, career, feminism, dreams and goals, and more. Meet Isake Smith! Isake is an epic multi-tasker. She has been known to sing, row, and facilitate, all at the same time! She is currently a… Read more →
By Jessica Newsome I want to tell you everything that happened when I was with my ex-boyfriend. I want to bitterly recount to you what I had to reckon with after our break up. I want to tell you how much it galls me when he posts feminist blogs and posts on Facebook as if he never behaved reprehensibly… Read more →
As a part of our interview series, Flawless Project contributor Jessica Newsome has been asking flawless women in different fields and life places seven questions about life, career, feminism, dreams and goals, and more. Meet Emily Bowles! Emily is a former professor of English, which is how she met Jessica Newsome, her former student. Since 2007, Emily Bowles has worked… Read more →
By Hannah Renee Paasch I didn’t leave him. I probably should have. I didn’t leave him when, the day after our wedding, as we roadtripped back home, I had to pull into a gas station on the side of the road, sobbing and shaking, because his verbal attacks caused me to have a panic attack behind the… Read more →
