Blog of the Week: 2 B Sophora

I've been reading 2 B Sophora for quite some time now. Sophie is a New Zealand feminist and dairy farmer. I've learnt a little about dairy farming from her posts, recently she wrote about the effect of the drought on her farm. I've also learnt about rural women's lives.

Her post about childbirth and the experiences of women she knows is incredibly powerful:

My mother is in her fifties. From her I've learned that stitches *hurt*. That being shaved feels horrible as it's growing back. That enemas are standard procedure (my child mind said 'ugh!'). That she was put under intense pressure to be surgically sterilised after every birth until the third "I think they gave up on me at that stage".

I visited Katie with her newborn and she told me how she 'behaved like a bitch' because she didn't want the nurses to touch her, but they told her it had to be done anyway (putting a monitor on her stomach).
That was her third birth. She 'slept through her second', terrified of repeating the trauamatic long labour of her first. For months approaching the third she was unable to relax, expecting once again the nightmare of her first delivery.

I'm not sure her comparison with cows is valid; my understanding was that walking on two legs meant that our pelvises were a lot smaller than other mamals, and made child-birth more dangerous. But the issues she raises are really important

She also has a amazing post for Blog Against Sexual Violence Day.

Go check her out out

Blog of the Week: Elsewhere

Welcome to 'Blog of the Week', a new feature here on the Hand Mirror. Each week we will be linking to a different blog by a New Zealand woman, to draw wider attention to the many awesome things women are saying.

I'm going to kick this off with Else Woman, by Anne Else. Anne Else was heavily involved with the women's liberation movement in New Zealand in it's earliest days, and she was one of the co-founders of Broadsheet. She's written some really important books on New Zealand women, including False Economy, which looks at paid and unpaid work in New Zealand. She also edited Women Together, a history of New Zealand women's organisations, which is essential for anyone interested in feminism.

One of the real weaknesses of feminist writing on blogs, is that it is so dominated by younger women. It's fantastic to have someone with so much knowledge and experience posting as well, and everyone should go read her.