My best friend and devout Christian, asking the questions I already know the answers to, but now so can you. Seeing her views on her childhood, worklife and even boys?! God Forbid?!
Yes, I grew up in a Christian home where faith was always an open topic. However, when I reminisce on my childhood growing up in a Christian home is never something that stands out to me. We went to church every Sunday and I would always go with my best friend Sophie which I loved! But faith wasn’t too serious, in relation to my childhood it always stood out to me as something fun. Whether that was the summer camps, youth parties on Friday nights where you would play games which involved custard and wellies or just mucking around with the rest of the kids.
I grew up with not always the easiest of circumstances where my mum sadly has not been well all my life suffering from chronic fatigue which meant my dad was always over worked. It did however develop in me a really positive perception of the Christian faith. Faith was never forced, I always had the right to choose whether I wanted to go to church. I’ll be honest most of the time during my childhood and teen years I simply went for the social life. But faith being obligatory never crossed my mind, I saw it as hope, church a family and something special which made my mum happy and strong.
How has religion affected meeting guys, job and your social life? I always pray about the decisions in my life whether big of small…as silly as it sounds sometimes I even pray when I meet a guy if I should go for it or not. Surprisingly all the times God’s told me no and I’ve listened to him its later become obvious that guy was definitely not the man for me and I always feel so thankful I didn’t go out with him, even when, at the time, I so wanted to and was rather pissed off God had said no.
When it came to work asking God was no different, I didn’t go to Uni as I felt it wasn’t God’s plan. So here I am working for an incredible church with people who I love and connections for the future that have put me in a really good position. If it wasn’t for my faith I wouldn’t be dreaming of creating my own business which runs workshops to empower and teach women on topics I feel passionate about. I would be happy being comfortable as a receptionist and slowly climbing the career ladder but due to my faith I believe there is a more I can pursue, I don’t want to stand still. I can’t wait to go wild with creativity, write books and talks. When I look at my Christian friends and how faith has affected their jobs I’m so proud too. I’ve recently been asked to join the board of my friend’s new business which is an app based business that hosts monthly pop up Friday night youth gathering. They create a night out for those who don’t have plans, it connects them up with new friends and if they want connects them into youth groups where churches and community centres can make connections which can lead to mentoring and all kinds of opportunities as community is so important. Another Christian friend has recently started a business called ‘Bright Cube’ it’s just got funding and the plan is big. The concept is sharing small bright ideas, giving a platform to young creatives so that as a
generation we can rise up together helping each other out while inspiring others. This excites me! This is what I want to see and my motivation is my faith…why? Because God gives me a love for people, an excitement to make a positive difference, he makes me want to be bold. As for my social life…of course my faith has hugely dictated this. It’s not that I need the compatibility of religion or faith to be friends… far from it actually and I have never wanted to be part of the church bubble where you live and breathe Christians. Its more that when you jump into committing to a church and get involved with lots of different things you end up forming really nice friendships which end up growing into friendships outside of church. But let’s all be honest, like mindedness is a real blessing and is something I have always valued in my Christian friendships as they learning in faith as I am. It’s always reassuring to have a friend who can see things from your perspective and understand your way of thinking. As for the social life my friends and I are always having dinners and things. Maybe we do things a bit different, we don’t go out drunk but we all meet up and have such a laugh. I don’t ever feel like I’m missing out and if I do it’s because I’m thinking with a very perfectionist out look that I doubt really exits.
For those people who aren’t Christian do you think lesser of them or try and convert them?
Do you feel like there are some negative connotations that come with being a devout Christian?
I never think less of people, I would hate the idea of someone thinking less of me purely because I am a Christian so treat others how you would like to be treated. As for converting, it would be wrong of me to say I wouldn’t like people to experience what I have experienced through faith, however I believe that choice needs to be made by that person purely for themselves, so who am I to try push someone into a particular outlook or lifestyle? As a Christian I feel my responsibility is simply to live life with God and if people like what they see then they are more than welcome to explore the Christian faith.
I used to think I had to fight the battle of making Christians cool but I think I’ve come to an outlook of ‘I’ll just do me’. One thing I actually find as a connotation of being a female Christian is dating…from both a Christian and non-Christian perspectives. I know a lot of non-Christian men instantly make the assumption I’m frigid or not fun…I find that hard as I instantly feel like I’ve been made less because of that and I don’t really think that’s fair, as to me it shows I have a great deal of dedication and…well…self-control…let’s be honest just because I’m Christian doesn’t mean I’m not human. But I must admit I’m happy with the life choices I make. As for Christian perspectives, I often get tired of the view the Christian women are slightly desperate. Not always known by non-Christians is that in the church there is a gender gap; there is one man for every two women. This sometimes means the perspective for certain people is that women are always on the hunt, slightly desperate, waiting with the ring already on the finger just waiting for the words ‘I do’. I find this really hard, I guess most of it is pride but also because who said I needed a boyfriend to be happy? I’m still finding out who I am, I’m only 20. I want to make it clear this is not something all Christians think, just something that annoy me of those who do. It’s not a perspective that empowers women and encourages women, it almost puts women down making men superior and that is not something that I feel God believes nor does the church.
Asking Rosie, a close personal friend and modern day feminist and activist her views on society’s opinion on gender and the antics she gets up to at protests.
What does being a feminist mean in 2017? It means fighting for equal rights, but it is more than that, it’s more about empowering women, acknowledging that women have less opportunities that men do and de-constructing this idea that we have about gender. I think in today’s society we have very rigid gender structures, which oppress us, because we feel we have to adhere to certain roles, confining us to those genders.
Do you think that the term feminist is sometimes misinterpreted? I think there’s a number of different reasons why it’s miss interpreted, sometimes women don’t want to seem unattractive to men, to misogynistic men, but why would you want to seem attractive to these people if they’re not respecting you?! Also because there is this negative image associated with feminism people think that those ideals don’t stand for what they believe in, but it’s because they only take the anti-men stances but don’t acknowledge it in a wider system of oppression. I have a lot of friends who don’t call themselves feminists because they think feminists are angry men hating people who chop penises off and get pissed off all the time and focus on non-issues. I don’t like it when feminists focus on one kind of woman. Women come in different sizes and shapes and colours and even some women have penises.
Can you expand your last point? What is your view on gender? Some people identify as non-binary the whole idea of gender, gender on how you socialise and how, you identify yourself not by your
and don’t like is based more in your head, sexual organs.
Do you feel as a female that there are certain hardships that you face? I mean as a female and like any other female I get grope, attacked and spoken to like I’m less of a person because of my gender.
Do you think that’s a problem that a lot of women face? Yeah defiantly I think its seen a lot more in Hollywood and in the film industry, you have to prove yourself a lot more. If you’re assertive you have to be really assertive. People are just more likely to listen to men, generally as a rule, because people associate masculinity with confidence. If a woman is a lot softer and more sensitive which are ‘good traits’ to have, feminine traits to have its not seen as decisive or assertive, as it should be, those things shouldn’t contradict each other. A woman shouldn’t have to take on masculine traits to be powerful, sensitivity and kindness are things that make us powerful as women anyway, and maybe men should try taking on feminine traits as well.
“... which oppress us, because we feel we have to adhere to certain roles, confining us to those genders.” Do you feel if men did take on more feminine traits they’d be picked upon or belittled? Yeah defiantly, I mean I’ve been in situations before where men have been disagreeing with people and being like you shouldn’t say that because that’s going to hurt someone’s feelings and just generally being sensitive to the situation and open, and they just get shut down completely and taken the piss out of and that makes them not want to act like that again.
Would you say you’re an Activist? Yeah!
What does being an activist mean to you? Being involved in protests, organising people, getting discussions going and changing people’s ideas.
What sort of protests do you attend? Recently I went to a black live matters one about the shootings in America and having solidarity with the black men and women that had been killed.
Do you feel like protest help or do you feel like it just adds fuel to fire? I think when it’s a very specific cause with a specific argument then it’s a good thing because you have a direct message. But when you have a general march like the Women’s march when there are so many different issues going on, that march focused on white feminism, they weren’t focused on one specific idea on one specific issue, I think sometimes that can get a bit messy. A feminist protest that I went to was not adding fuel to fire, but also just not helping the cause. I felt like some of these women were making people not want to be feminists, they had tampons hanging from their ears, and throwing blood over walls. Acts like that just paint such a negative picture of feminists. The protest was for good causes but it’s like what is that actually going to achieve, you’re just angry. Of course protests should have direct action and you do sometimes need to be aggressive but there is a line that you just don’t want to cross.
From your experience from going to protests have you seen people take it too far? Yeah, I mean the photos that I took for the student protest, a group of us actually, blocked off this Police van, we all held hands around it because these people were trying to kick it and vandalise it. It was to protect the police van but not to protect the police - getting this image that we’re not violent people, and as soon as the media gets one picture of people being violent at a protest that’s the picture they are going to use. The media tries to portray us as mindless hooligans.
Have any of the protests that you’ve been to have you ever seen anything positive come out of it? I went to an anti-abortion one, and they just packed up all their signs. I think that one was an especially good one because they had these propaganda posters and I just think if a young girl was seeing that passing by that can really influence her and the fact that they weren’t there that day, we protected a lot of young women. There was another one that was an anti- EDL (English Defence League) one where they were just shouting a lot of racist shit, and we protested right in front of their protest and they packed up and went home, and something like that means they wouldn’t recruit anyone that day.
Do you feel like a lot of EDL beliefs are spurred on by Brexit? Defiantly even before it’s been implemented there have already been so many incidents of racial hate crimes, I feel like there’s this sea of Islamophobia and Brexit is really just legitimising that xenophobia.
Do you think living in London helps being able to attend these kinds of protests? Yeah defiantly because I know so many people who are so disengaged with protests and they don’t think they can help at all but it’s because no protests really happen outside of London and that’s something that needs to change. We really need more protests and direct action.
Do you think even if these protests you attend don’t make a massive impact does that influence whether you attend them or not? I don’t think so because there is always the chance that you can make an impact, if that is the only thing you can do to make an impact you may as well do it.
Rosie asked me afterwards why I chose her for this feature. Little does she realise that she is one of the most driven people that I know, constantly striving to do more and make an improvement on ... well let’s face it ... currently, a pretty shit world.
A short publication introducing you to the people in my life who inspire me, regardless of our differing views. The people I know and now you can to.