October 27th, CPCC, 6:15 p.m., Charlotte, NC October 19th, Keynote, Women of Faith, YMCA, Shelby, NC. October 14th, Keynote and Facilitator, Ashoka's Youth Venture Program, Nashua, NH October 12th, Keynote, Girls on the Run of Union County, Breakfast, Weddington, NC. October 3rd, Keynote at the Family Business Network Social Entrepreneurship Day, Chicago, IL. October 1st, Presbyterian Heathcare, Journey to Health, Keynote, Charlotte, NC September 29th, Keynote at the YMCA Leadership Retreat, Cleveland County, NC. September 25th, "Lit From Within: An Evening Girls on the Run," Charlotte, NC September 24th, TEDx Speaking Engagement, Charlotte, NC. September 8th, Marvin Ridge Middle School, 6:30 p.m. Upcoming Speaking engagements and appearances: (For any information regarding these engagements or to consider me as a speaker (or facilitator) at your next event please contact Susan Gray at 3rd, CPCC, Charlotte, NC To purchase either one of my books please visit our website at Our power comes not only from our increasing awareness of how sexism is institutionalized in our music, videos and entertainment, but the building momentum, I see through my work with Girls on the Run, to consciously and intentionally turn it off. I won’t watch 3OH!3, listen to them, or talk about them ever again and invite you to do the same. We also have fathers, brothers and other men in our lives that would cry out in anger if any one of us were silenced, deafened or blinded by abuse, violence or any institutionalized form of sexism.īut we don’t see the connections, between lyrics and words like this and the continuum of circumstances that demoralize us, demean us and leave us without our voices. Women make up at least half of the population. Yeah…maybe I do need to lighten up, but right now, right this minute, if you go on the internet, google the lyrics to this song, you will see literally hundreds of videos of little girls, teens and young women, dancing, performing and shouting out this phrase, either unaware or uncaring of its implications. She was too young to birth a baby, torn from the inside out, reeking now of urine and feces and discarded from her community for speaking out against this heinous crime…by simply begging for medical treatment. Or maybe I talk about Natia, raped in her small Ethiopian village at age 13. Purposely addicted to drugs by her abductors, she spent her teens and early twenties, silenced by the drugs and beaten by her owners. What about Sarah, only now at age 35, is recovering from her experience as a victim of sex trafficking-only now able to talk about the fear, pain and brutality of her captors. Then there is Rebecca, who cried out no, so many times that her rapist permanently silenced her with a gun to the back of her throat. Two-thirds of the way through our program she mustered up enough strength to collect her belongings, her two children and leave an abusive husband. What about Joanie, a Girls on the Run coach. The fear even then of speaking up on her daughter’s behalf was overwhelming…requiring weeks to overcome and even more weeks to gather the courage to seek help. The voice of that pain remained dormant until the pattern repeated itself with her husband and beautiful daughter. What about my smart friend Britney, sexually abused by her father through middle school. Speaking where she lived only got her cigarette burns, a slap across the face or “time out” for hours, in a dark closet. Or do I begin with Sharkira…my fourth grade friend who was beaten and neglected so badly by her parents that she stopped speaking. Where do I start? With the Helen Keller comment or the implications that girls should just shut up and be nothing more than sexual objects, conquests or empty, soul-less shells.ĭo I start with my Girls on the Run friend Shelley? When Shelley entered fourth grade, she was embarrassed so badly by the response of her peers to a question she said in Math class, that she stopped talking. Do the Helen Keller, and talk with your hips.” If you pulled some songs off my I-Pod you would find everything from the Weather Girls, Jonas Brothers and a few Britney Spears hits.īut this one…this one has gotta go. I have to admit that I’m a pop radio listener. But this one has really set me off…set me off so much that I’ve got to write about it.ģOH!3, a duo pop band from Colorado is making the Top 40 rounds with a song entitled, Don’t Trust Me. “I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat…”
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