This is Julia, New Moon Online Editor/Project Coordinator, blogging to share my excitement about our new New Moon Girl Media YouTube Channel! The first video posted is a trailer for our orb28 blog for teen girls, which shows New Moon girls in action--brainstorming, working together, speaking out, and making their dreams for orb28 into a reality. I am so honored and inspired to work with these girls, and it was quite nostalgic editing the footage from the retreat into this trailer! (I also really enjoy the accompanying song, "Race You Back Home," and am glad indie female songwriter, Elizabeth Ziman let us use it! Check her out with her band, Elizabeth and the Catapult.)
The New Moon Girl Media YouTube channel is also the kick-off to more multi-media-filled days at New Moon. We'd love to receive your videos on why YOU love New Moon! Why do you think New Moon is positively unique? Why is it important in your life and for girls everywhere?
You can submit your video to add to the trailer excitement! And we of course welcome your written testimonials of why you value New Moon as well.
Please help us spread the word about this video and our YouTube channel by rating, commenting, and sharing the trailer with family and friends. I'm excited to hear your feedback...Thanks!
]]>I loved playing catch with my dad, brother and cousins. Once I even manged to break my cousin Rich's nose with a hard throw! (I don't remember ever playing catch with another girl or a woman.) But I never thought of myself as an athlete and instead put my physical energy into modern dance, which I also loved.
When I was 18, Title IX - the federal law that illegalized gender discrimination in any educational institution that receives federal funds - was born. I didn't hear anything about it at the time.
Well-known now for its dramatic effect on equalizing athletic opportunities for girls and young women, Title IX stayed totally off my radar screen until a good 20 years later when my friend Emily, a rabid hockey player who took up the sport in her twenties, started fighting for the creation of girls' hockey teams in Minnesota high schools. She and an equally passionate group of women made it happen, against many odds. And Title IX was the key they used to open the door of ice arenas all over the state to girls. Emily's daughter Laurel went on to play Division I hockey at Boston University, a great testament to her mom's vision.
So by the time Title IX turned 36 years old earlier this week (June 23), I had become a huge fan of it. That was a quick 1/3 of a century! The results of Title IX's ban on gender discrimination in education are all around us in girls' high school & college teams, and in the WNBA. Less well-known but just as important is how Title IX pried open the door for admission of many more women to medical schools, law schools, engineering schools, architecture school and traditionally male-dominated careers like auto mechanic and computer programmer.
While there's been resistance to Title IX in many educational institutions, the NCAA has become a strong supporter of Title IX under the leadership of Myles Brand. When the Bush administration mounted a full court press in 2003-05 to weaken Title IX, the NCAA joined the Women's Sports Foundation and many others to successfully defend Title IX.
So imagine my surprise and dismay when I saw this NCAA psa while watching the underdog Fresno State team win the College World Series. The PSA shows 10 athletes playing basketball, dressed as professionals ranging from doctor to judge to police officer, making the point that most NCAA athletes "go pro" in something other than sports. (Of course, that's especially true for women since there are still very few sports that even the most talented women can "go pro" in!)
The thing that irked me is that only 3 of the 10 athletes on the court in the PSA are women. The message that sends to both girls and boys is painfully clear - even 36 years after Title IX became law, things still aren't fair to female athletes and professionals. I have to admit that's reality, but I hate to see the NCAA present a powerful vision of inequality that will stick with both girls and boys sub-consciously. It's the subconscious "realities" and biases that are the toughest to change.
Mr. Brand, it's unworthy of the NCAA to create and air anything giving a message of inequality. I'm very disappointed and hope for better next year. I know you can make that happen.
Note: Readers can help by emailing Myles Brand with your Title IX stories and your suggestions for future NCAA PSAs.
]]>I can say a lot about both the film and Darryl. But the most important thing is, GO SEE IT! And TAKE ALL YOUR FRIENDS! (It's R-rated due to something Eve Ensler says in an interview but is far more appropriate for teens than any other R-rated movie I can think of.)
After getting home, I kept thinking about the film and what I can do to help pre-teen and teen girls believe in and honor their inner beauty and fight the popular media who hold their self-esteem hostage.
From my fan email to Darryl at 1.30 am this morning: Your film moved me so deeply – I’m very grateful that you’ve made such a powerful film and that your motivation for doing it is so personal and genuine. Your powerful spirit and conviction come through so strongly in the film and in person. Having heard about the film from my friend Carolyn Costin, I’ve been eagerly waiting to see it.
My personal passion and life mission is to help girls recognize the value of their own unique spirit and experience the power of their voices in the world. That’s why my twin daughters and I started New Moon Girl Media when they were 11 years old.
For 16 years at New Moon, we’ve pioneered and developed our Share the Power method with girls ages 8-15 as creative decisionmakers to create healthy media for girls. Our mission is Bringing Girls’ Voices to the World. We’ve done this with New Moon magazine and by creating opportunities for girls to be activists in the world. And on Sept. 1, we're launching a creative online community for girls ages 8-12 that will bring these opportunities to even more girls.
The issue of New Moon magazine that I gave you is a special annual issue called “25 Beautiful Girls,” that we’ve published since 1999. The idea for this annual issue was brainstormed by our Girls Editorial Board as an antidote to the malignant “beauty as physical perfection and material excess” culture that girls and women are being drowned out by every day.
Every issue of our magazine honors girls for their inner beauty – the beauty of compassion, action and creativity. We started the “Turn Beauty Inside Out” campaign to give girls and boys, women and men, tools and space to speak the truth to popular media about the great harm our culture’s narrow and exclusionary definition of beauty causes to us all. One of the things I particularly value about your work is the compelling way you show how this warped definition of beauty hurts boys and men just as much as it hurts girls and women.
I look forward to exploring how we can work together to bring the message of America the Beautiful and Turn Beauty Inside Out to tween and teen girls and inspire them to action on behalf of their inner beauty. I am excited to envision how we can help you spread this message to girls – it will be an honor!
Readers - please comment and share YOUR ideas for how we can all help each other, and especially girls and boys, in this critical work.
And please share with me when you feel beautiful -I want to make a long, long list of when women and girls feel beautiful for who we are and what we do - not for how we look or what we own!
I can't wait to hear from you about it.
]]>My daughters are 27 now (twins) and never acquired the habit of relying on fashion magazines for advice about life. That's not to say that they never read them!
]]>My daughters are 27 now (twins) and never acquired the habit of relying on fashion magazines for advice about life. That's not to say that they never read them! In their early teens, they read Seventeen and similar publications even though we had started New Moon magazine as an alternative to the typical girls' mags.
At first, I agonized about whether or not to let them read those magazines because I knew firsthand how damaging they were. I'd been a girl who looked to Seventeen, Ingenue, and later Glamour for instruction on how to be prettier, more popular, more confident, and all around different from who I really was.
Of course, every time I read one of those magazines I ended up feeling worse about myself instead of better. Each copy was filled with contradictory propaganda and advice. The quizzes pinpointed my personality shortcomings and the fashion spreads showed clothes I knew I'd never own. I saw myself in the "fashion crimes" photos and faithfully tried each new diet (and faithfully failed at each one). One year, most of the money I earned babysitting was spent on a secret stash of new makeup products recommended each month that were touted as so much better than what I had bought the previous month. (And I barely ever used them as I could only put them on in the bathroom at school since my parents wouldn't let me wear makeup.)
Even the advice columns made me feel inadequate since I didn't have the problems (mostly about boyfriends and I didn't have one) they gave advice about! As a mom, I obviously didn't want my daughters to be subjected to the undermining propoganda in typical girls' magazines. But the magazines are everywhere and I knew that trying to prohibit them (the way my parents had tried to ban makeup) would just lead to sneaky reading.
So when they asked for the magazines I bought them. But I didn't stop there. I also read them and talked with my daughters about them. That's what led to these strategies about how to help girls resist the harmful influence of popular tween & teen magazines.
These resistance strategies helped me stay connected to and support my daughters as they learned for themselves that they didn't want the propoganda churned out by most teen girl mags. It was a happy day for me when I noticed that they had stopped asking me to buy the magazines. After a while, I asked them about it and Nia said, "Reading those magazines made me feel so depressed. I don't need that!"
Please let me know what bothers you most about the messages in teen & tween magazines by posting a comment.
]]>University of Minnesota research finds that teen girls "who frequently read magazine articles about dieting were more likely five years later [emphasis added] to practice extreme weight-loss measures ... than girls who never read such articles."
]]>University of Minnesota research finds that teen girls "who frequently read magazine articles about dieting were more likely five years later [emphasis added] to practice extreme weight-loss measures ... than girls who never read such articles."
That's terrifying for parents, grandparents, aunts & uncles, teachers and youth workers because we know most girls will read those magazines at some point. What to do? Here's Part One of how you can counter their harmful influence.
To be continued with Part Two ....
]]>Hey girls,
You're the most important part of New Moon Girls and we want to invite you to be on the new Street Team that I'm coordinating-take a look at what this is about! At New Moon we want the world to hear from girls, respect girls, and support girls' dreams. The Street Team will help more and more girls everywhere use their voices, achieve their dreams, and work together in ways that matter.
]]>Hey girls,
You're the most important part of New Moon Girls and we want to invite you to be on the new Street Team that I'm coordinating-take a look at what this is about! At New Moon we want the world to hear from girls, respect girls, and support girls' dreams. The Street Team will help more and more girls everywhere use their voices, achieve their dreams, and work together in ways that matter.
You can use your voice and spread the word about New Moon Girls magazine and New Moon Girls online! Find out more about what the New Moon Girls Street Team is doing in June and all the fun ways YOU can get involved. New Moon plans are always centered on girls and their ideas so I want to hear from you!
Feel free to e-mail me and with questions and ideas, and I'll send you an application to join the team and get some street teamer goodies. Now you can share your love for New Moon while being an ambassador for girls and their dreams!
If you want to join the street team or if you've got thoughts on what Street Teamers could be doing...or even what we should name our street team, give me a shout!
Thanks!
Julia
juliab@newmoongirlsmedia.com
For Parents & Other Adults: You can join the Street Team, too - email Julia for more info on what you can do to help.
Thanks for helping us reach more girls - they benefit from New Moon and you can get it to them.
]]>The event will take place July 14-15, 2008, Hotel Nikko, San Francisco, CA
]]>The event will take place July 14-15, 2008, Hotel Nikko, San Francisco, CA
According to the Ypulse people, "The 2008 Ypulse National Mashup is the only grassroots event that brings together youth media and marketing professionals from brands, agencies and the non-profit sector to share best practices for reaching today's totally wired youth. Learn what's new in the youth marketing space today and what's coming tomorrow." Sounds awesome to me!
Check out the Ypulse Mashup site for more info.
-Julia, Online Editor
]]>My reaction was to see if/how bras are being marketed to girls that young in the U.S. A quick click on the "Girls Bras" ad-link at the end of the article netted an entire page of links, including Young Girls' Bras at Jockey, which start with a child's size 7. GapKids, Target, Maidenform, Vassarette, and Nordstrom's were also listed on the girls bras page of shopzilla. (Ironic name, eh?)
Now I can understand a young girl wanting to occasionally pretend to be older and more grown up, and enjoying playing dress up with her mom's & aunts' old clothes. That's creative and healthy. But the bras being marketed in sizes for very young girls are intended to be worn as daily underwear, like the undershirts often displayed on the same page.
That's real-life sexualization, not make-believe play. And it's not the least bit healthy for girls before puberty to get the message that they need to or should wear a bra on a daily basis, especially not a padded bra designed to look sexy. In fact, the American Psychological Association issued a report of its Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls last year and found that existing research points to many negative effects of sexualization in childhood.
From the report:
Research evidence shows that the sexualization of girls negatively affects girls and young women across a variety of health domains:
The good news is that we parents hold many of the keys to helping our daughters resist the harmful effects of childhood sexualization. Check out the report and tell me what you think by clicking on the comment link.
Written by New Moon founder and CEO, Nancy Gruver
]]>To find out more about the orb28 project and issues girl teens care about, visit the orb28 blog at http://orb28.blogspot.com!
]]>To find out more about the orb28 project and issues girl teens care about, visit the orb28 blog at http://orb28.blogspot.com!
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