Girl Power 3.0 interviewed master blogger and feminist activist Majestic Legay about their relationship with technology. Read more about Legay's blogs at That's So Majestic and Glitter Politic.
GP3: Please tell us your relationship with technology. For example, what field are you in? or How do you use technology in your spare time?
ML: I use the internet to blog about body politics, queer identity, whiteness and decolonization and love.
GP3: If you have a good relationship with technology, how did you forge this? What experiences provided you with the tools to feel confident using technology?
ML: I mean, I just always had access to a computer growing up, and I saw the internet as a way to have a voice. Newer blogging websites like Tumblr strive to be very user friendly, so I just saw that other people were doing it and jumped right in!
GP3:What barriers did you face,if any, due to your gender or gender stereotypes?
ML: I would say there were few barriers that stopped me from accessing the internet due to my gender, but that gender is a white and western one so perhaps that is why.
GP3: How, if at all, is technology tied into your identity? ie. Identity production...
ML:I talk a lot about identity politics and identity online. I started out my blog as “innerfatgirl” and was welcomed into the ‘fat acceptance’ community, which on Tumblr is largely white women. Coming out as trans/gender queer really changed that but it also opened me to new political online communities that I wasn’t as much a part of before.
GP3: What, in you opinion, prevent girls from accessing or feeling confident using/producing technology?
ML: I think just the notion that women/those socialized as women don’t have a voice or something to say. For me, my blog has given me a voice which has encouraged other people to use their voices in their own ways that make them feel strong. Getting over the fear you have nothing important to say is a fear many people I know who are women or were socialized women face.
GP3: What message would you give to girls today about pursuing technology or computer based fields?
ML: I really don’t know a ton about technology/computer based fields. I’d say fake it till you make it.
So there you have our survey results from Magestic Legay. I personally LOVE this Tumblog. We wanted to include Magestic in our project as a person who uses the internet to engage in queer-girl politics. As someone that uses the internet to speak their voice, and someone who considers this to be an online community-contributing regularly Magestic's story was so important for us to highlight. This is a perfect example of queer identity production via internet ie. Girl produced media. Just as in Susan Driver's book, Queer Girls in Popular Culture: reading, resisting and creating media, the internet provides an alternative to mainstream, mass media messages about heternormative girlhoods being the norm. These sites provide a place to resignify and reread narratives about sexuality and girls lived realities. They expand the options of media performativity and complicate embodied images available to girls. Instead of queer representation being exploited and appropriated by the skinny, white girls we see kissing on teen dramas as of late, we see a step back from comodification and enter the realm of 'talking back' to media representations. Instead this area of the internet is reserved for opposition to institutional images of girls. We see queer girls engagement with and resistance of popculture. And it is awesome!
GP3: Please tell us your relationship with technology. For example, what field are you in? or How do you use technology in your spare time?
ML: I use the internet to blog about body politics, queer identity, whiteness and decolonization and love.
GP3: If you have a good relationship with technology, how did you forge this? What experiences provided you with the tools to feel confident using technology?
ML: I mean, I just always had access to a computer growing up, and I saw the internet as a way to have a voice. Newer blogging websites like Tumblr strive to be very user friendly, so I just saw that other people were doing it and jumped right in!
GP3:What barriers did you face,if any, due to your gender or gender stereotypes?
ML: I would say there were few barriers that stopped me from accessing the internet due to my gender, but that gender is a white and western one so perhaps that is why.
GP3: How, if at all, is technology tied into your identity? ie. Identity production...
ML:I talk a lot about identity politics and identity online. I started out my blog as “innerfatgirl” and was welcomed into the ‘fat acceptance’ community, which on Tumblr is largely white women. Coming out as trans/gender queer really changed that but it also opened me to new political online communities that I wasn’t as much a part of before.
GP3: What, in you opinion, prevent girls from accessing or feeling confident using/producing technology?
ML: I think just the notion that women/those socialized as women don’t have a voice or something to say. For me, my blog has given me a voice which has encouraged other people to use their voices in their own ways that make them feel strong. Getting over the fear you have nothing important to say is a fear many people I know who are women or were socialized women face.
GP3: What message would you give to girls today about pursuing technology or computer based fields?
ML: I really don’t know a ton about technology/computer based fields. I’d say fake it till you make it.
So there you have our survey results from Magestic Legay. I personally LOVE this Tumblog. We wanted to include Magestic in our project as a person who uses the internet to engage in queer-girl politics. As someone that uses the internet to speak their voice, and someone who considers this to be an online community-contributing regularly Magestic's story was so important for us to highlight. This is a perfect example of queer identity production via internet ie. Girl produced media. Just as in Susan Driver's book, Queer Girls in Popular Culture: reading, resisting and creating media, the internet provides an alternative to mainstream, mass media messages about heternormative girlhoods being the norm. These sites provide a place to resignify and reread narratives about sexuality and girls lived realities. They expand the options of media performativity and complicate embodied images available to girls. Instead of queer representation being exploited and appropriated by the skinny, white girls we see kissing on teen dramas as of late, we see a step back from comodification and enter the realm of 'talking back' to media representations. Instead this area of the internet is reserved for opposition to institutional images of girls. We see queer girls engagement with and resistance of popculture. And it is awesome!
Thank you Magestic!
