Whoopi and Elmo

Tooday is Sesame Street’s 40th anniversary, and we’re big fans of it in our house! We love the ideology behind its original formation (accessible preschool education for low-income urban kids) and the vast array of important issues they handle on it. Granted, I’m personally partial toward the old school shows. But my three year old loves the new ones, so we watch both.

Given that interfaith dialogue is very intimately connected with cross-cultural and “race” relations, and since this blog is about, in essence, how we look, I think this video is completely applicable. Not to mention, I love Whoopi and Elmo both!

Cost vs. Ethics

First of all, I apologize for not posting for a while, but I was sick with Swine Flu – that’s right, my whole family caught H1N1. Fortunately, it was a mild strain, and we’re all pretty much better now.

But that’s not the only reason I wasn’t posting. I was having trouble completing the assignment I set out for myself. In a week, my toddler is going to be a flower girl. We have the dress, but I need to get her some shoes, and our baby needs a dress for the wedding, too. For that matter, so do I. I also need a whole new wardrobe for school – not so much because I’m a die hard fashionista (not at this point in my life certainly!), but because when you have a baby that means (at least in my case) over a year you gain circa 60 lbs, and than over the next two years you continuously shed all of it. That means over three years you need about 3-4 wardrobe changes. This all, of course, costs money.

And that is what I want to rant about today. Money. The almighty dollar. Unfortunately, at the same time I need all these new clothes, I also got my OSAP estimate (for those of you outside of Ontario, that stands for Ontario Student Assistance Program, in other words, loans). My husband and I sat down and planned out our monthly budget, and there’s enough for our monthly costs, but just. There is certainly not enough to buy many clothes at all, even at bargain basement prices. So how, I ask you, can I afford a $45 fair trade organic cotton dress for my baby, as much as I may want one? My husband’s response is simply, “We can’t.” 

Now, I am a believer that you can make do with less – buy fewer items and buy them fair trade. Absolutely! But that assumes you have disposable income, and with two kids and a Masters degree, well, we don’t. Let me be clear, I’m not trying to whine about my plight (okay, well maybe just a little). But more about the frustration that I don’t want to buy the sweatshop clothes. I want to dress myself and my family in not-doused-in-chemicals-and-not-made-by-children-slightly-older-than-my-own clothing. But my first priority is to make sure they do have clothes. Fair trade is a lot more affordable than it used to be. But when you’re living on a fixed income, $45 might as well be $450.

We will continue to try our best. My husband had a wonderful suggestion. Set aside something like 20% of our already allotted grocery budget (or whatever) and use that towards buying eco-fair trade products. But once it runs out, it’s gone, and that’s it for that month.

Modesty’s Effect

Kris McDermott left this post here:

“I’m not very familiar with the modesty movement, but I’m curious- what sort of implications do you think the modesty movement has on modern women, either religious or secular?”

Hmm. Very interesting. I decided it was worthy of an entire post. First of all, let me reiterate that this blog is not about telling anyone how they should dress. It’s a place for the exchange of ideas. So here are some of mine, and please, leave a comment to say what you think.

A “modesty movement” can be a very dangerous thing. Take Iran. That is a case where the powers that be decided what modesty would be, and imposed that image onto the women of the country (Iran, by the way, is by no means the only place where this is true). They did not/do not care who the women really are, what’s inside of them, what a woman’s own image of herself is. Instead they pull women before the revolutionary committee because she has long eyelashes, and so they suspect her of using mascara. A principal trims a girl’s fingernails until she bleeds because her nails were “immodestly” long. A group of university students eating apples gets reprimanded by the school morality squad because they were biting “too seductively”. (These are all true accounts from Dr. Azar Nafisi’s memoir Reading Lolita in Tehran) The authorities have imposed their own vision of modesty on others, and I don’t support that in any form, from any belief system.

Lest we Christians in the West get too high on our morality horses, let’s remember the Christian missionaries who died of heat exhaustion when they came to hotter climates, rather than take off some clothes! And of course there are the wonderful things we did to the Indigenous populations in the name of modesty:

 

 

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Photos: Saskatchewan Archives Board R-A9223-1, Thomas Moore as he appeared when admitted to the Regina Indian Industrial School, and R_A8223-2, Thomas Moore, after tuition at the Regina Indian Industrial School [ca. 1897

 

On the other hand we have pre-teen girls dressed “sexy” because that’s what it means to be a woman (right?) and caught between two worlds, they would rather emulate grown women than little girls. There’s an interesting discussion of this here In my opinion, while there is nothing wrong with sexy clothes, in and of themselves, (hey, it’s nice to feel sexy sometimes), there’s a time and place, and an age. I feel the Girls Spider Web Sexy Tights, made by PrettySinful, are inappropriate. Who makes clothes for an 11-12 yr old girl with the word “sexy” in them? 

So this is what I believe:

• A woman should always be able to wear whatever she chooses, whether it’s a burqa, or a bikini.
• A man is always responsible for his own actions. A woman never ”asks” to get raped. (Women got raped in Afghanistan under the Taliban, you know, even though you couldn’t get more covered)
• Modesty is in the eye of the beholder (see my post on this).
• Within these frameworks, there is such a thing as what is appropriate. You wouldn’t wear a gown to the grocery store, or go to church in a negligée.
• There is also age appropriate.
• In the end, this is something each woman needs to work out for herself, or each parent/child team needs to discern.

Fair Trade for Women’s Styles

As I said on my welcome page, I want to spend a lot of time exploring whether or not it’s possible to outfit yourself and your family stylishly, yet ethically. See my last post on Fair Trade to see what I mean by this. So for the next while I’m going to walk through the reasons why we need to buy Fair Trade, and follow that up with some good finds I’ve dug out of the internet closet.

We all know that our clothes are made in horrible sweat shop conditions, often using exploitative child labour, or people who are, for all intents and purposes, enslaved.

There are few people callous enough to ask, “so what?” But the world has so many problems. Practically everything we buy hurts somebody, and everything we eat is going to cause cancer. Arsenals of nukes that could destroy the Earth multiple times over hang over our heads on a daily basis, many of which are improperly maintained in the former USSR. We are always on heightened alert about terrorism, and we keep a constant watch on our children, lest the unthinkable occur and they be snatched away from us. It can be so overwhelming that most of us simply shut it out as best we can in order to cope. Our lives are already so full of important matters to care about: family, friends, jobs, school, finances, volunteer work, church, synagogue, masjid, temple, committees, activities, etc. etc. etc. The list goes on and on, and this economic recession doesn’t help.

After a long day, full of commitments and activities that require more giving of ourselves, how can we be expected to save the world on top of it all, too?

  ”I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; And because I cannot do everything I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.” `Helen Keller

No one lives a perfectly consistent life – it’s not possible. We’re all human. But we can try to do better. In Doris Longacre Janzen’s book Living More With Less, Bertha Beachy, an MCC worker in East Africa for 20 years observes, “North Americans find it very hard to believe that their wealthy ways of living affect poor people on other continents. But in Africa, people are fully convinced that North Americans and their actions strongly influence their lives.” The author responds with, “We’re skilled at screening out and arguing away this connection. We don’t believe it, but the poor do.”

So let’s start with some women’s fashion. Fair Indigo is a great place to find Fair Trade and Eco-friendly clothing. It’s a little pricey, but often Fair Trade is. We’ll discuss that in a future post, but for now, considering buying fewer items then you would from a department store, knowing it’s for a good cause, and can help de-clutter your life. Here are some of my favourites from their site (one of the great things about this company is that in addition to some very nice stand-out shirts, they also stock a bunch of affordable basics – crew neck Ts, camis, blouses, turtlenecks, etc.):

Organic Pima Circle-neck Tank $32

 

Washable Rayon Split-neck Top $45 (on sale for $22.50)

Ellen 3/4 Sleeve Shirt $39 (sale $16.50) 5 colours

1/2 Sleeve Shirt $49, sale $14.50!

Washable Rayon Cowlneck $54

Cotton Batik Print Skirt $59

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Matte Jersey Tulip Skirt $59 Graphic Leaf Print Flip Skirt - usually $69, on sale $24.50

Fair Trade Clothing

 Fair Trade textiles is a topic near and dear to my heart. When I was in  high school, after reading Craig Kielburger’s book, I decided to only wear clothes that were made without exploitative labour. At the time, it turned out to be impossible. All I could find were some funky Guatemalan sweaters, or the odd t-shirt. Even expensive names were made in less than equitable conditions. Fortunately, very slowly, this is beginning to change. In a later post I will tell you more about where you can get fair trade clothes. 

But first, why buy fair trade?

 Because this is what happens when you don’t.

And this is what happens when you do.

It can be really hard to find fair trade products – at least everyday products. One of the things I would like to explore with this blog is this question: Is it possible to live purely fair? How about even mostly? Where can you find these things?

Some Summer Outfits

Here in Ontario, we’ve had a cold spring. Yesterday was 11C. In mid-June! I had to go buy the girls some warm clothes, but do you know how hard it is to find long-sleeved baby wear right now? And then, of course, there was the usual problem. Have you ever noticed that in little boys’ sections there are more warm clothes than in little girls’? Even when you can find a girl’s turtle neck, it’s made out of a lighter cotton than the boys’. This ticks me off. When I tried to find a long-sleeved onesie for Gwen, I had to go to the boys’ section. What? Even baby girls can’t be warm? Last Fall we lived in an old, drafty house, and when Gwen was born we went in search of fleece sleepers to keep her warm. Guess where we found them? That’s right – the boys’ section. Yes, there was one fleece sleeper designed for girls, but it was a lighter fleece than the boys’! 

One of Gwen's "warm" sleepers - light weight

"Boy's" polar fleece sleeper

But back to summer clothing – warm or otherwise. I found this real gem company, called Coverwear. Unlike a lot of the companies that focus on modest clothing, this one makes clothes that looks stylish! The idea is you buy their shirts and use them as undershirts with any style, to “modest them up” a bit. Whether your goal is modesty, or warmth, or to hide stretch marks, these shirts are a great idea!

This is their Classic Cap, and comes in pretty much any colour.

This is the same thing, but with lace - and really, who doesn't love lace? (Besides Mr. Bennett in Pride and Prejudice, or course)

They also have camisoles, one crocheted, and one with lace.

Crochet Camisole

Lace Camisole

I would pair one of these shirts with this:

Suzy Shier Safari Shirt. $28

Although I’d probably just button this one higher. It would look nice with this:

Embroidered Floral Skirt by Suzy Shier. $25

This is a jacket that would be good for this cold spring and to cover a shirt you might like, but feel is too revealing.

Belted Linen Jacket by Suzy Shier. $35

I’d like it with this:

Suzy Shier Sleeveless v-neck rose shirt. $25

That’s all for now.

Cheers,

Laura