Ypulse Youth Website Profile: fbomb
The latest installment in our Ypulse Youth Website Profile series is a review of teen feminist site fbomb, officially launched by 16-year-old Julie Zeilinger in July.
What it is… according to the description on the site, “A blog/community created for teenage girls who care about their rights as women and want to be heard. Young feminists who are just a little bit pissed off and very outspoken are more than welcome here.” Appropriately, said welcome wagon is led by Julie Z, a young, slightly pissed off, very outspoken feminist herself who also happens to be a prolific blogger/cultural critic/activist, all while somehow managing to fit in a little thing called high school. Juggle much?
Who it’s for… the press release and Julie may claim the space in the name of young feminists, but the site has definitely also seen the presence of adult women, particularly those from the blogging and academic communities that focused on female-centric issues.
What works for us… we love to see a niche filled, and this empowering platform that encourages young women or men who identify with feminist (or however you’d label the movement these days) beliefs to speak out and channel that energy productively does just that — whether that product be in the form of expression, activism or just validation. Of course, it’s especially refreshing to see this effort spearheaded by an actual teenager, not to mention one that articulates her points with as much wit and levelheadedness as Julie. Clearly she comes from the Jezebel/Sarah Haskins (both regular links that crop up on the f-bomb) school of commentary where you win more readers with snark than outrage (even though there are undertones of outrage) and this approach seems crucial when addressing an audience of cynical teens and young adults who may not see the relevance of the “fight for equality” in the terms of an older generation. Now that Julie has wrangled up a few more contributors (including a couple of guys!) and gained more traction with her original target group of peers, it should be an even more dynamic starting point for dialogues and debates.
Challenges… an obstacle that seems to be working itself out naturally as Julie is joined by teens and college-aged bloggers covering topics that specifically pertain to that age group is the (well-intentioned) intrusion of adult voices. Not that there shouldn’t be a space for intergenerational discussions on the site, just in a way that doesn’t inadvertently undermine the teens’ authority — like Julie’s recent interview with feminist icon and Ms. magazine founder Gloria Steinem. My other concern for the site is the slightly more complicated question of semantics — a sentiment that this generation lives in a post-feminism society. Although Julie has addressed the issue in a recent post and in interviews has mentioned that peers who don’t identify as feminists have been reading the site, I wonder whether the site would do well to offer a starter kit of sorts to serve as an access point for those types of novice or curious skeptic type readers as well as a general archive of articles and maybe some ways to take the discussion offline. Finally, as of now, the site is free of ads and banners, and while I couldn’t see that space used for traditional advertising, I think it definitely has potential for some cross-promotion with sites or orgs that have similar goals in mind.