Remember Meg Cabot?

Holy Monk on a Motorbike, Meg Cabot was the shit. How could I forget about her? I feel oddly guilty.

So allow me to explain why I’m always broke:

1. I'm 22.
2. Amazon has really perfected the art of recommendation.

Usually my love of YA lit would have me bombarded with books about mysterious teenage were-fairies or whatever. But recently, Amazon’s been going for a kind of throwback vibe. It all began when I picked up Kendare Blake’s Anna Dressed in Blood. It was a pretty good read, but I found it really reminiscent of…something. Some YA series I had read and loved. I couldn’t figure out what book it reminded me of, and that nagged at me for days. Eventually I took it to Google, and after several edits of my search terms, I finally found it:

The Mediator by Meg Cabot.

Meg. Cabot.

Why did forgetting about my one-time favourite author make me feel so guilty, you might ask? Because, Meg Cabot was one of a handful of authors who inspired my young feminist self with her kick-ass teen-aged heroines. I didn't know it at the time; I didn't even know I was a feminist, really.

Meg eased me in with her breakout series; The Princess Diaries. Mia Thermopolis was awkward and different, and she was a princess.

I was awkward! I wanted to be a princess!

10 year-old me was hooked.

Pretty soon I was reading every Meg Cabot book I could get my hands on. Next up was The Mediator, and then All American Girl, and then my personal favourite; Avalon High.

Meg’s characters were my fictional role models. They were independent and clever and motivated. They all had such a strong sense of their own morals, and they were entirely the heroes of their own stories. Not to mention; they were consistently sarcastic, which to a pre-teen is the epitome of 'cool'. Best of all, her heroines became stronger and livelier with each new release.

Mia Thermopolis

"I am the princess of Genovia. I am the newly elected head of the AEHS student council. And NO ONE – not even Michael – is going to tell me when to Do It."

In The Princess Diaries, Amelia ‘Mia’ Thermopolis, a fourteen year old “nobody” finds out that she is heir to the Genovian throne. Mia can barely get the pretty head cheerleader Lana Weinberger to stop picking on her for five minutes – how can she be expected to rule a country?

But rather than morphing into a 1950's Disney character, Mia finds herself empowered by the tiara thrust upon her head. Over the next four years (and ten books), we see her lead the student council, befriend the outcasts, defend the meek, stand up to bullies and grow into a passionate and ambitious young woman.

Sam Madison

“I mean, instead of sitting in the White House press office for three hours after school every Wednesday, or attending International Festival of the Child concerts, I could have been out there alerting the public to the fact that in some countries, it is still perfectly legal for men to take teen brides -- even multiple teen brides! What was that all about?”

Samantha ‘Sam’ Madison is the charmingly defiant and artistic protagonist of All-American Girl. She spends her days dying her entre wardrobe black and sketching commissioned portraits of celebrities in her German notebook. But in a chance encounter outside an Art studio, Sam saves the life of the US President – and is quickly labelled a ‘hero’.

The best thing about Sam is that she refuses to conform to the common perception of what a hero should be. Sam is glad to have saved her country’s leader – but she won’t compromise who she is for him. Throughout the book and its sequel, Samantha stands up for what she believes in. When she’s asked to be the Teen Ambassador to the UN, she plans to use her position to inspire her generation. When she’s asked to endorse the President’s ‘Back to Family’ bill – a cause she doesn’t agree with – she is blunt and honest when interviewed about it, even though her views may be unpopular. Sam is a hero – just not the kind of hero anyone expected her to be.

Ellie Harrison

“He was supposed to be this great innovative thinker who wouldn’t do things the way people told him they had to be done, because that’s the way they’d always been done. If Will really is Arthur—and I’m not saying he is, because I think this whole thing is wack—would he really just sit back and say, ‘Oh, well, I can’t change this, because no one’s ever done it before,’ and just leave you to die? No, he wouldn’t. And you know what, Mr. Morton? I’m not going to, either.”

Elaine ‘Ellie’ Harrison is the new kid at Avalon High, where her blossoming social life begins to draw major parallels with Arthurian Legend. It quickly becomes apparent that her insta-crush Will and his friends might just be King Arthur and his court reborn. When “the forces of evil” threaten to destroy an unsuspecting Will, Ellie finds that she plays a much bigger part in the legend than anyone imagined.

Ellie is athletic, and laidback (her favourite past time is floating), and unfalteringly compassionate. In the end, she is not the ‘hero’ of the story in the most traditional sense – Will is King Arthur incarnate. But Ellie is The Lady of the Lake. She is his saviour, his rock, and to quote blogger Erin Callahan, the “Smart Girl Who Figures It Out and Saves The World By Not Backing Down.” Ultimately, she played the most important part in the story.

I’m so excited to have re-discovered Meg Cabot - she’s inspiring me all over again! As someone who writes YA fiction, my greatest aspiration is to move my young audience in the way that Meg moved me. I know she never really went away, and I know plenty of people read her newer stuff, but to me - re-reading all the books I loved as a kid - this is her grand comeback.

“I don’t know where these people have been, but princesses have been rescuing themselves in fiction for quite some time now.”

                                 -  Meg Cabot

Women Online

As we all spend so much of our time online these days, it’s hard not to get caught up in the sense of community built by most social networking sites. You’ve got all your friends on Facebook, you’ve got your favourite blogs bookmarked, you follow people on Twitter who intrigue and inspire you. And then on top of that, you might have a favourite social news site like Reddit or StumbleUpon that is updated and frequented by people just like you.

The internet is all about community - and it’s pretty hard to swallow when your community turns against you.

I imagine that’s how Anita Sarkeesian felt when her online feminist commentary was met by a wave of vicious opposition and harassment just last year. On May 17^th 2012, Sarkeesian launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund a web series that explored female cultural tropes. The answering campaign was, quite simply, disgusting.

In response to her request for sponsorship, brave Keyboard Warriors photoshopped images of the activist to portray her being raped by video game characters. An online flash game was created, where players could beat up Sarkeesian’s avatar, bruising and battering her until she eventually bled out on screen. Her Wikipedia page was frequently edited to display graphic sexual images. People tried to access and share her personal contact information, and congratulated each other on their successful harassment of the young feminist.

Gameplay from the 'Beat Up Anita Sarkeesian' flash game

But Sarkeesian responded with such grace and dignity that the abusive campaign, designed to stop her from receiving any funding, completely backfired. Sarkeesian posted details of the abuse to her blog, where fans, feminists, and general decent human beings were so outraged that they succeeded in raising $150,000 to help Anita speak out to a broader audience.

Anita Sarkeesian’s horrific ordeal may have ended triumphantly, but it is a very real (if extreme) example of how women are often received in online communities. And not every hateful comment or campaign is resolved with such success.

While the Anita Sarkeesian campaign began on Kickstarter, which is by nature highly publicised, there are of course the more personal sites such as Facebook and Twitter, where the harassment against any part of a community is often much more harsh, and much more harmful. Less than two weeks ago, 17-year-old Jinan Younis wrote an eloquent and thought-provoking piece for The Guardian newspaper entitled “What happened when I started a feminist society at school”. I almost knew what had happened before I read it. I knew that Younis was not writing about the overwhelming support that her feminist efforts had received from her teachers and peers. Isn’t that sad? That I would see that title and immediately assume the worst?

As it turns out, I was right. In the article, posted 20^th June, Younis recalls the uproar that followed after her feminist society posted the below image to Facebook.

Young students take part in the 'Who Needs Feminism' campaign

“We were told that our "militant vaginas" were "as dry as the Sahara desert", girls who complained of sexual objectification in their photos were given ratings out of 10, details of the sex lives of some of the girls were posted beside their photos, and others were sent threatening messages warning them that things would soon "get personal".”

These are girls aged 16-18, whose attempts to create for themselves an equal, supportive community was met with a landslide of abuse and derision. Sixteen year-old children were attacked and humiliated, openly objectified and threatened. So what did the faculty do to punish the bullies?

Absolutely nothing. 

There were no repercussions for the boys, and the girls were instructed to remove the images from Facebook. When confronted about their handling of the situation, the school maintained that they are “committed to protecting the safety and welfare of [their] students, which extends to their online safety.”

What’s really disturbing is that this aggressive attitude towards women isn’t even that uncommon on Facebook. The global social networking service has recently come under scrutiny due to its failure to appropriately deal with the vast amount of misogynistic content on the site. This includes 'fan' pages with titles like “Drop-kicking sluts in the teeth”, “Kicking your girlfriend violently in the fanny because she won’t make you a sandwich” and “Violently raping your friend for fun.” Many of these pages have thousands of ‘likes’ and have remained on the network for years. There have actually been petitions to delete them, because simply asking Facebook to remove horrific hate speech from their site initially did not get results.

Other examples of misogyny from the Facebook community include “titillating” pages with images of naked women, and celebrities in skimpy clothing. This kind of pornographic content has often been allowed to remain on the social network for extended periods of time. Meanwhile, Facebook concerned themselves with removing pictures of mothers breastfeeding their babies. An example of this bizarre double-standard is the once popular page titled “Bra Busters” – but this particular example does come with a fist-pumping tale of feminist victory. As told by The Daily Dot back in May, ‘Bra Busters’ fell apart when six feminists gained control of the page and replaced all of the sexual and misogynistic content with Feminist memes and Virginia Woolf quotes.

Because almost all of us have a significant online presence, our interactions on the web are very telling of our general attitudes. It is, therefore, extremely disheartening to see women verbally abused and harassed so frequently and determinedly. As the web becomes the dominant form of communication, it’s becoming even more important for us to create safe and supportive communities, not just for women, but for everyone.

We’re not quite there yet, but here are some of my favourite female-friendly online communities, and individuals who are proudly paving the way:

www.youmeandcharlie.com

Founded by actress Dianna Agron, You, Me & Charlie posts emphasise whimsy and self-confidence for all.

www.hellogiggles.com

HelloGiggles was co-founded by Zooey Deschanel, so you can expect plenty of upbeat posts promoting compassion and confidence.

www.betcheslovethis.com

Betches Love This is a tongue-in-cheek social news site presenting ‘Betch Culture’ as the female answer to ‘Lad Culture’. While I wouldn’t exactly call it a feminist site, it is written by some funny betches.

www.xojane.com

XOJane, founded by Jane Pratt, is a women’s lifestyle site that offers opinionated and uplifting articles.

www.galadarling.com

Gala Darling is a self-help blogger who promotes ‘Radical Self-Love’ and sequins galore.

www.jezebel.com

This social news site advertises as “Celebrity, Sex, Fashion for Women. Without the airbrushing.” ‘Nuff said, really.