I love my self.

The reason why everyone should love themselves no matter what they've been through.

I love my self.
Good for you, they say.
Good for you, we don't care.
Ha, if for one moment you thought a silly little girl like you was worth the time, you've must have been dreaming hard.
But the fall is harder when you're way way up, they said.
You should come back down from that cloud of smoke, they said.
Because in a world of scrutiny you must feel scrutinized.

Its only cool when you post about it on tumblr though.

See, they didn't realize they've been tumbling through life.
Their "big thighs", their "thigh gaps", gapped only when they're posting with tact.
See, they know what their doing.
Needing assurance from others who claim to be "broken."
Because being broken from
body shaming, slur naming, retweet claiming,
thats whats "hip" right now.
Bigger hips, must work out, healthy is #key,
major key thats what.
But if you dare say you love yourself,
you're c o c k y.
They put words in your mouth.

"Who are you to think you're better than everyone else?
We definitely don't think you are..
Do you even eat?
How can you love yourself?
You anti-feminist!"

Because being a anti-feminist is the biggest insult there is.
Advocating for women's rights in a place
where women have all but might, they say.
But they cant see, blinded by their misery.
See, were i come from women wear the pants,
they been left alone too many times.
Over coming their petty crimes.
And for them to say women are being cat called in the streets,
is that a joke?
Because Margaret fuller, Harriet Beecher,
Susan B Anthony, Elizabeth Blackwell,
Emily Dickinson,
they did not fight for our freedom and the freedom of others.
Because the 19th amendment was obviously not ratified,
because the equal pay act of 1963 never passed the house lines.
Is that a joke?

I cant love my self because i don't think people have to fight for me anymore?
See they think loving my self means i'm the best that i can be,
that would mean society is fixed,
leaving them with nothing else to do but love themselves too.
Thats too hard.
No! Loving your self means you accept your self,
realizing that the people who love and support you are there because you are willing to love and accept them back.
They say "we're trying to fix society" but society wasnt broken,
it became crooked with your high expectations,
your bad relations,
the knife you take to your skin because you saw it in a book
and wondered "is that the next thing in?"
Lets not make generalizations,
not everyone knows your story,
not everyone HAS to know your story.
If you want people to empathize, maybe you should tell them your dress size.
When you realize they don't care, because they're too focused on their own flare,
you'll realize loving yourself is not really that hard.
And when they tell you #blessup, you smile.

Author's Note

The grammar is nowere near ideal, this is a first draft. Please analysize how cohesive and understandable this argument is. Nothing in this is meant to be offensive what so ever to ANYONE. Thank you :-)

Reviews

[Quinn W]

This poem is a little all over the place but the point still comes across very well. In this society they tell you to love yourself and to have confidence but when you show it they say that you're arrogant and stuck up.

"Loving yourself means that you accept yourself."

I completely agree with this line because if you love yourself, you don't think you're better than everyone else. You've accepted who you are and have come to love who you are, both on the inside and outside. You're not overly confident or arrogant.

Your poem expresses the real side to society and feminism and I commend you because many people are too scared of what others wold say to write this and put it on the internet. I'm glad that you realize this and are brave enough to express it.

[RememberMe]

Thank you for your feed back.:-) Do you have any suggestions on how I could have made my point come scross more smoothly?

[Quinn W]

I think something that could help is to express more of the feminism side. You only briefly talk about it in your writing. If you added more on the subject or explained it more, it would greatly help. That's just my opinion and my advice. Don't feel obligated to take it. It was a very good poem and you don't NEED to change anything. It would just make more sense, in my opinion.

[RememberMe]

Well thank you for your opinion c:

[Mitch]

I think its very relevant, so good work. I'm not sure I follow the idea of loving yourself to "anti-feminist". Is this something that you have seen specifically? I like the idea of having a distorted idea of what you should be or look like when there isn't anything wrong with you in the first place.

I like how you moved to end on the same idea you started with. I would advise on looking at transitions between your ideas. If they are semi related but don't really work, maybe you have two different pieces to work on.

[William Liston]

I totally agree with the message of this piece. Loving yourself shouldn't be something that society looks at as "arrogant" and "over-confident," but it should be something that all humans need to do. Just because you love yourself doesn't mean you can't recognize your own flaws--it just means that you can look at those flaws and still think you're beautiful, which is something that everyone needs to do.

I like how you used clever wordplay in this piece, especially the third stanza. It was very unique. I thought it worked well and still made sense when read from a page (or in this case, a computer screen).

As far as how "cohesive and understandable the argument is," I must say that though this poem is, for the most part, understandable, there are times when I was confused. Take the stanza that begins "Because being an anti-feminist is the biggest insult there is"...I didn't understand that stanza nor did I see how it related to the topic. Could you please elaborate on what you meant? I'd love to tell you how you could make that clearer.

Also, I sense that (and I could be wrong) you're using sarcasm in the last stanza. Though there's nothing wrong with this when you're speaking in front of an audience, sarcasm must be used with caution when it comes to printed/typed words. Whenever you SPEAK to someone in person, the listener can hear your voice and realize that you're being sarcastic, but when someone READS the poem, the sarcasm can become confusing because a reader can't hear your voice. I'd like for you to explain what you meant in the last stanza also, and I'd also like to know if my observation regarding your use of sarcasm was correct.

I know you said the grammar is "nowhere near ideal," but just as a quick comment about the grammar, I'd suggest you use grammarly.com. It's a good website for checking grammar mistakes.

Hope this helped. If you have any questions, comments, and/or concerns about my review, please feel free to message me or respond to this review.

-William Liston

[RememberMe]

Thank you for reviewing my piece and for the feed back. On this work i did employ the use of sarcasm, specially in the third stanza. Also, when i "spoke" about Feminism it was being a bit sarcastic as well. At this moment in time people all through out social media, specially twitter and youtube, have been comparing feminism to the best that anyone can be. And if for any reason anyone does not comply with society and its norms they are quick to judge. Numerous amount of people have compared to those who try to stray away from society's perfectly imperfect line of norms, are being called "anti-feminst." I see how this might have come off as comfusing for those who dont have background knowledge on the matter :( . Though, I'm not aware on how to make it clearer. Thank you again for your feed back really appreciate it. :-)