As a kid, I was always mad – just noticing the women at Thanksgiving, running around the kitchen, while the men were watching football. For one, I don’t want to cook, and for two, I hate football. I was stuck in the middle.
Beth Ditto | thanksgiving Read More »
I feel sorry… for people who’ve had skinny privilege and then have it taken away from them. I have had a lifetime to adjust to seeing how people treat women who aren’t their idea of beautiful and therefore aren’t their idea of useful, and I had to find ways to become useful to myself.
Beth Ditto | women Read More »
As a kid, I was always mad – just noticing the women at Thanksgiving, running around the kitchen, while the men were watching football. For one, I don’t want to cook, and for two, I hate football. I was stuck in the middle.
Beth Ditto | women Read More »
Girls are taught to sing high and pretty, like Antony, not low and from the guts like Nina Simone. But we’re slowly trying to change that. There are so many things we’re not told growing up, and it’s our true feminist responsibility to take the truth to the people who need to hear it.
Beth Ditto | truth Read More »
Reclaiming the word ‘fat’ was the most empowering step in my progress. I stopped using it for insult or degradation and instead replaced it with truth, because the truth is that I am fat, and that’s ok. So now when someone calls me fat, I agree, whereas before I would get embarrassed and emotional.
Beth Ditto | truth Read More »
When I was a teenager I would lock myself in the bathroom for hours, bouffanting my hair like Patty Duke and trying to recreate Barbra Streisand’s flawless eyeliner, only to comb it all out and wash it all off before stepping out into the world a butchish bisexual teen.
A few years back, when my style was ‘punk grandma,’ I picked up an amazing pair of sandals – orthopaedic ones, with really thick soles. I’ve given them away to a friend now, because these days my look is more ‘1980s substitute teacher gone wild.’
Beth Ditto | teacher Read More »
When I moved out of my mom’s house at 18 I was almost as sad to leave her sewing machine behind as anything else.
I was brought up by a single mom in a poor town in Arkansas and while some aspects of small-town life were really positive – like the fact that everyone there is really sweet and hospitable – there is also this close-minded mentality, and that naturally made me want to rebel.
Beth Ditto | positive Read More »