Introduction to Charlie’s blog

It’s finally time for me to start a blog! I’m hoping that it’ll help get the thoughts that revolve around in my head out of my brain and help me sleep at night, and who knows maybe someone will read it and find it interesting 🙂

People seem a little confused as to why I talk about such intense stuff, especially on Facebook, and maybe this will explain why. My time in the UK from 2012 to 2014 was seriously tarnished by some extreme low points in my life. So naturally I turned to the internet for help and it turned out that the most supportive websites that understood what I was going through tended to be from the feminist perspective (yup, I’ve dropped the F-bomb early). As it turned out, they’re pretty cool with you wearing a bra, or burning it, whatever you wanna do. So I kept reading and learning and here I am.

So… Hello! I’m Charlie, I’m an employed, young, well-educated, able-bodied, skinny, white (appearing), mostly straight, cis woman (i.e. not transgender) from a forward-thinking first world country who had a comfortable upbringing by an emotionally and financially supportive family.

The reason that this is important, is that I am writing from, let’s be honest, an extremely privileged perspective. My life is inherently a lot better than many. Put me in any other country and I’m likely to move through life with less obstacles than many other women. This is situational and I am extremely grateful to be where I am. However, this also disturbs me.

In my privileged life, I have encountered a surprising amount of issues because of my feminine appearance. This ranges from the thousands of microaggressions that I’ve been the recipient of in day-to-day life, through many larger aggressions, to a couple of really quite traumatic incidents (that are also, unfortunately, surprisingly common).

So I guess the thought is; If this is happening to me, it is happening to other women like me, it has happened to women before me, it will happen to girls after me, and it is happening more frequently and more intensely to females who are not straight, not white, not cisgendered, living in poverty, living in corruption, not able-bodied, and who are otherwise discriminated against.

This freaks me out.

I want everyone to be happy!

And this is why I like to talk about those harder, less glamorous subjects. They affect the people around us, whether we like it or not, and I’m totally cool with being “that guy” who talks about things like rape or who will call someone out on their double-standards (even though it can sometimes be seen as annoying or “outspoken” at times #sorrynotsorry).

I think that if I talk about enough stuff to enough people, at least one person might stand up to their friend for using homophobic language, or someone might get a better understanding of what consent really means, and not have sex with that drunk girl. That would mean that in that moment there’s one less gay person feeling discriminated against or, ya know, one girl not raped. Yay!

If I can turn my personal negative experiences into a positive experience for someone else, balance will have been restored and this bullshit that I’ve had to live with will all have been worth it.

So yea… That’s why I’m starting a blog. To rant and rave like this and hope that people find interesting, gain some understanding, or start a discussion with me if they don’t get it or think I’m wrong. I’ve been known to listen every now and then and sometimes even come to a compromise or change my mind entirely. Whaaat?! But probably not, cos I’m always right 😀

Watch this space. Love love love <3