Finding Pants and “Normal” Bodies

On the weekend I went shopping for some new work clothes. The goal of this trip was to find pants. I loathe finding pants. My hips and waist don’t conform to the fashion industry’s ideal of what women should be shaped like so finding business clothing that actually fits is next to impossible. That is until these new “comfort” fit pants appeared on the market during the past couple years. Some very brilliant designer decided to create stylish pants and skirts that were stretchy and did not feature button arrangements that resembled torture devices.

Maggie Enters the World of Twitter

As can be seen above and on the sidebar of this blog, I have officially entered the world of Twitter. I’ve had a neglected personal account for a while, but I can’t say I really understood the purpose of microblogging or the possibilities behind such a tool until recently. Like many, I labelled Twitter as some silly modern tech widget that would die out quickly. As can be seen, however, the microblogging service reported a record of 4 billion tweets during the first quarter of 2010. Who knew such a simple service would take off so well?

It was through renewed attention to my personal Twitter account – thanks to the security issues facing Facebook currently – that I realised just how useful Twitter could be for social justice writers and activists online. I followed a bunch of bloggers and agencies on my Twitter account and I was suddenly bombarded with links to interesting articles, events and volunteer opportunities. I learned about things that I could have easily missed on a normal blog simply because Twitter allows you a quick overview of what’s going on with your followers without scrolling past long posts or checking secondary pages. Furthermore, as a blogger, you see so many interesting and important articles and pieces of news that you want to share with your readers, but it’s impossible to write about everything you see. Twitter offers writers a chance simply to share what others have said. Twitter can also be used as a call to action, where people can share knowledge of upcoming events or requests for help. In short, Twitter is a hell of a lot more useful than I ever initially expected.

I added a Twitter to this blog because I tend to be a slow writer, but I am a very rapid consumer of media online. I read far more than I know I will ever write about, so I want to share what I find with others. Plus it’s a lot easier to deal with a Twitter feed than Facebook where you need to wade through all those Farmville updates… In any case, expect to see this Twitter feed updated several times a week and further social justice accounts followed. Feel free to suggest interesting people in the comments!

Quick Hits: Mother’s Day Musings, Toronto Pride Defunding and The Girl Effect

I. Changes and Goals

I am a content consumer. Possibly to the excess. Being a producer is rather hard for me, but it’s been a consistent goal of mine over the past while to alter this behaviour. I tend to write long, critical essays, but I think I need to start mixing it up if I ever hope to update more than every several months. Consequently, this post starts a series of “Quick Hits” which will feature news articles and short musings on whatever I happen to think needs attention in a given week. Hopefully this new format will help me achieve my goal of weekly updates.

See below the cut for information and thoughts on Mother’s Day for non-traditional families, the recent defunding of Toronto Pride by the Conservative government, and a link to The Girl Effect, an amazing organisation dedicated to changing the world!