At first, protests by Ukrainian feminist group Femen were ignored by the media.  But two years ago the women started taking off their shirts.  In recent months, their tactic has spread to France, Canada, and Brazil. Back home, in a basement office in downtown Kyiv, Oleksandra Shevchenko, a Femen founder, rebuts critics who say Femen protesters attract media attention for the wrong reasons. “When we mixed nakedness, intelligence and our ideas, we saw that it is working,” she says.  “People saw this contradiction, they are not ready to see, and to listen to women, and to see aggressive >>>

— At first, protests by Ukrainian feminist group Femen were ignored by the media.  But two years ago the women started taking off their shirts.  In recent months, their tactic has spread to France, Canada, and Brazil. Back home, in a basement office in downtown Kyiv, Oleksandra Shevchenko, a Femen founder, rebuts critics who say Femen protesters attract media attention for the wrong reasons. “When we mixed nakedness, intelligence and our ideas, we saw that it is working,” she says.  “People saw this contradiction, they are not ready to see, and to listen to women, and to see aggressive >>>

I was grateful to have been invited to join a conversation about the future of feminism that looked specifically at the tactics of Ukrainian protest group, FEMEN on Al Jazeera English's show The Stream last week. Inna Shevchenko, the leader of Femen International and Chloe Angyal of Feministing.com were guests on the show and the producers invited feminist bloggers Chrissy D, Ariana Tobin, Sara Yasin, (who are all the best, fyi), and myself to bring in critical perspectives and questions. I've posted the show in it's entirety at the bottom of this post. The show was pretty >>>