MCOM #2: "tell me something you're passionate about"

I get this question a lot. And I'm about to tell you a little something about myself.

I'm a feminist.

Here's the problem with the society that I live in: "feminism" is thought of as a 4-letter word. When the word "feminism" is brought up, people instantly start thinking of radicalism and man-hating. I have a hard time with this. Because guess what? Feminism isn't being anti-makeup and anti-stay-at-home-moms and anti-men. Feminism is equality. If you want, you can call it that. But the fact that I've been on countless dates where I've been asked, in a surprised tone, "oh, so you're a feminist?" is actually appalling. OF COURSE I'M A FEMINIST. ARE YOU NOT??? Feminism is gender equality. Simple as that. It shouldn't be a big deal to say that you're a feminist. But for some reason, people make it a big deal. Please please please appreciate this video of Emma Watson:

So what does it mean that I'm a feminist? It means that I believe that people should be able to choose what they want to do with their life without the judgement of other people. That's it. Just because I want to be a stay-at-home mom with my kids when they're little doesn't mean I should judge women that choose to work {whether out of financial obligation or just because they choose to work}. And vice versa. If a woman is a stay-at-home mom, you can't truly call yourself a feminist if you judge her decision. But basically, I'm a firm believer in letting people do what they think is best for their life and not judging them for it. After all, I sincerely hope that people treat me with the same courtesy.

But feminism is so much more than whether or not a woman works. But I've decided that this is not the blog post for me to rant about my problems with society and the expectations of women {why the heck have we decided that women look better with black tar on their eyelashes??? ...that is me being anti-makeup, not feminism being anti-makeup, I promise} Why are there still places in the world that a boy's education is valued more than a girl's? Why the heck does human trafficking exist?? People, the world needs feminism.

The whole world. Not just part of it. The other day I was in a car and one boy looked at me and said "America doesn't need feminism. Sure, parts of the world does, but we're good here" FALSE. Remember that judgement thing I was just talking about? That doesn't just happen outside of America. America needs feminism. BYU needs feminism. Every human being on this planet needs feminism.

This brings us to the Women's March. Because people know that feminism is a big deal to me, I've been asked several times what I think about the Women's March. Let me tell you, if I didn't have intramural tennis last Saturday, I would have been there! And instead of trying to tell you why, I stumbled upon this blog post. While she has a lot of statistics that aren't backed up with citations, I love the general idea of the post.

Ok, here's one last little video I adore:

Ok. I don't have time to keep rambling about feminism, but people, I like feminism.

sometimes I wonder how I ever blogged.

Tonight I'm sitting by Kayla, we're watching our favorite TV show, and I'm trying to blog because I have to blog by midnight. But I can't think of anything to write. And that, my friends, is why I just turned to Kayla and said "how did I ever blog"?? Honestly, how did I ever write about my day-to-day life almost every day?? And that is the question.

So. Blogging is hard. I was going to write a nice long blog post this week about something but I don't have the motivation to write right now and I can't really think of what I would want to say. So this is me admitting that I don't really want to blog but I have to because it's an MCOM assignment. But the good news is that we can write about ANYTHING. Even about how much we don't want to write.

This week has been quite the week, has it not? The inauguration and women's march? That's actually what I was going to write about. So look forward to that! (not that anyone is actually reading this, but oh well.) Until next week!

MCOM #1: & puppies.

Hello! I'm back! How many times have I said that? A lot? Yeah. Well, this time it is completely honest because I am taking a class called MCOM 320 this semester and we're required to keep a blog. YAY! {kind of}. Best part? We can blog about anything we want, in fact, we're encouraged to blog about anything we want. Anything. So, alas, I'll start with a cute picture of Sister Kuhle, the two cutest goldendoodle puppies, and me. And if you just read "sister kuhle" and are wondering "whhaatt??"... yes, Sister Kuhle is married and yes, I still call her by her unmarried last name {she was my first companion and trainer on my mission, so "sister" and "kuhle" are how I knew her}. Habits die hard. Supposedly the rest of the world calls her Laura. I'll stick with Kuhle. Tangent. Anyways. Today we both got close to hitting our twenty hours of work so we decided to go on an adventure. I'm really enjoying not having Friday classes. So we went to the Puppy Barn and then found a wonderful new sushi bar! New favorite places.

So here's the life update: I loved last semester. I spent the majority of it in the library. And I don't think saying "majority" is even an exaggeration, sadly. But it was the best semester yet. This semester will be harder {academically} but even better {socially}. So we'll see what happens.

But I'm not really here to blog about my life. I just used the picture of the dogs because I once read somewhere that you should never publish a blog post without a picture. AANNDD I wanted an excuse to tell the world that my goal in life is to own a mini golden doodle (or a dog that's a mixture of yorkie, poodle, and maltese. It was adorable} Plus, I can't think of a better picture than two adorable goldendoodle puppies.

For our first blog post our teacher asked us to just write. He told us to sit down at our computer and just type. Find something we enjoy talking about and then just keep writing. Don't stop to edit. Don't stop to change things. So good luck understanding this:

A few days ago Kayla and I were spending time with a friend who recently returned from a mission. We had a wonderful conversation and somehow got on the topic of "remembering". He was specifically referring to remembering our conversion or remembering spiritual experiences we have had, but I think that the concept of remembering can and should be applied throughout everyone's lives. I think that looking back on our lives and the experiences we have had can be one of the most effective ways of progressing in life. Maybe I think this way because I love history and the quote about how we can learn from the past. or maybe it's for some other reason, but I like looking back. I like getting on facebook and seeing the posts that tell you what you were doing four years ago. I like thinking "wow, two years ago I entered the MTC" {which, as of tomorrow, is a true statement}. I really just like the past. And I'm not saying you should live in the past. I'm just saying that there's no need to feel like you can't/shouldn't think about or talk about past experiences. One of my pet peeves is when people say "so and so got home from their mission {or study abroad, or freshmen year, or whatever major life event happened in this person's life} and they're STILL talking about it." SO WHAT? There is a 100% chance that I will forever talk about things like my study abroad and my mission because guess what? I've lived life for 21.5 years and thus far, those were my most important/life changing/ influential experiences. I hope that it won't always be that way {because as much as I loved my mission, it shouldn't be the only life-changing experience I'll have}. But until then... I think it is a shame that people feel like they can't talk about the past. The past is what makes us us. So excuse me while I continue to make references to my love of Russia and England and how a little piece of my heart stayed in those places.