Month: June 2017

episodes podcast

Episode 4.1: Rethinking Sodom: The Bible and Queer Sexuality

It’s time to grab your chocolate again, as in this episode (which is a cutout from last week’s binegativity episode), Bethany talks about everything that is wrong with all of us disgusting (homo/bi/pan/a/…) sexual humans – according to religious bigots. But don’t despair! She then deconstructs everything and tells these zealots why THEY are wrong. If you need good arguments against scripture-based queernegativity and if you want to listen to Beth butchering Greek words, to Liz swearing and to Bea not knowing the names of the articles she quotes and making jokes that nobody finds funny, you need this episode. You’re welcome.

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By beth.byers / June 18, 2017
episodes podcast

Episode 3.3: Pregnant Bodies as/in the Public Space

Women’s bodies are routinely scrutinized, policed, touched without their consent and decided upon without their having a say in it. Don’t worry, it gets worse: being pregnant does not really change that; in fact, strangers might feel motivated to touch your belly or force you to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term. All we have is chocolate, ladies.

 

By beth.byers / June 8, 2017
blog

How do you persist?

Today is National Cancer Survivors’ Day, and it’s a day that’s close to my heart. In 2014, I was diagnosed with leukaemia, and after a gruelling two month hospitalisation, I had to go through a month of physical therapy to re-learn how to walk, talk, swallow, everything that I had so easily done before. A few months later, despite having nearly died three times during my treatment, I boarded a plane to England to work on my PhD. It wasn’t easy, and two years out from my remission date, I still struggle every day. And I have met so many people with similar stories, who, against all odds, persisted and showed the world (and, most importantly, themselves) that they would not be brought down, that they would fight with every fibre of their being.

We at She Who Persisted want to take today to honour everyone who has persisted, through cancer, sexual assault, depression, university work, job interviews, activism… Every journey is unique, and we want to hear about your persistence!

Below is a link to a poster we’ve created to tell us about your persistence (you can see the example image and then we’ve included a download link below). We’d love it if you’d download it, print it out, and send us a picture with a few words about how you’ve persisted. We want to build up a community that can support and love each other. You can send it to us either on Facebook or tag us in your posts on Instagram! We’ll be putting together a collage of some of our favourites, so you may even be featured on our pages! We also want to invite you to send us a picture, even if you don’t want to be identified in the photo – simply take a picture of it in front of your face or on a flat surface, like a desk. We still want to hear about your story.

Here’s some inspiration: my two-year in remission transformation!

These are templates that I downloaded from the National Cancer Survivors’ Day website.
This is our very own poster – a chance for you to show us (and the world!) just how you’ve persisted.

Cheers to you all, and stay nasty! <3

— Beth

Here is the blank template for the I Persisted poster in .jpg form!

Download the PDF here!

By beth.byers / June 4, 2017