Watching Voices of the Year Through a New Set of Eyes
There is one thing about a BlogHer conference that is a must. It's a must whether you are a blogger or a casual internet user, a woman or a man, or whatever. I think the only thing that matters is that you're human. Every human should experience Voices of the Year.
Strong words, right? They're true. Everyone should experience Voices of the Year.
Voices of the Year is the one event I know of where the power of words is celebrated as the walls that weave their way through the internet are shoved aside. The very short description of what it's about is that a handful of content creators are honored for crafting something powerful. Of that handful of people, a few of them get a chance to stand at the front of a full room and read their words out loud. The written word comes to life and is given more power through the voice of the author. It's a very big deal to have your work celebrated at Voices of the Year.
Each and every one of the posts that is read has the potential to change your view of the world.
That is why I took Alexis to Voices of the Year. While the topics of the posts that are read often swerve a little outside of the box of "safe topics" for someone her age, it's still an experience worth having.
And this is where I admit that this year's Voices of the Year fell short for me. There are a lot of reasons, but the main one was that Voices of the Year was mixed with the SheKnows Femvertising Awards. One minute the celebration was about the power of one person's words. The next it was about honoring a brand that did something fantastic to empower women.
I'd like to celebrate both things. It's important to recognize brands that are getting it right. It's also important to recognize people that are getting it right. However, mixing the two cheapened them both, in my opinion.
One minute a man was reading an incredible post that evoked a river of tears. It was a powerful, important, timely post. Just as he walked off of the stage, the room flipped a switch and suddenly a brand was on display, their carefully packaged advertising campaign front and center.
Oof.
That said, throughout the roller coaster that was this year's Voices of the Year, I sat quietly watching Alexis' reaction. I watched her process the powerful words. I watched her eyes carefully as she sat engrossed in award winning ads.
And I wanted to apologize.
I wanted to apologize to my 9 year-old that we were honoring words that shouldn't need to be said.
Between the words about racism and the empowerment of women -- both very important topics that need to be talked about -- I couldn't help but think "We should already be past this."
This campaign in particular, the "Like a Girl" campaign by Dove, included a video that both Alexis and I loved. But, really? It's 2015 and we haven't managed to quit using "Like a girl" as an insult yet? How is that possible?
I thought my generation would have fixed these things by now.
Instead it's going to be up to Alexis' generation to finish what we started.
And that sucks.
Tuesday, July 21, 2015
Reader Comments (2)
When I was in high school in the 80's I was score keeper on the baseball team. The coach would always call the boys ladies or girls to signify their weakness. Until one day I had had enough. I spoke up. I said that I took offense that he would use those terms to indicate that I couldn't do things as well as the guys. So he made me prove that I could do what the boys did just as well.
What Coach didn't know is that I had played softball for 10 years. I had learned to hit a baseball which is harder and smaller than a soft ball. My Dad figured if I could hit a baseball, I could hit anything else that was thrown at me.
So Coach set me up with a bat and our star pitcher. The pitcher lobbed a couple of ball my way. I had to look at him as if to say "I know you can do better than that". With that look, or star pitches threw me a 90 mile an hour ball right over the plate. I hit that ball into center field. I dropped the bat, looked at the coach, clapped my hands as if to wipe the dust off of them and told him to stop calling them ladies. Needlesstosay, I won the respect of every guy on that team.
So yeah, I do things like a girl because I am a girl.
great post.
and a great comment by mary.
:)