pro life ppl: we wanna protect lives also pro life ppl: let’s rape and ruin a woman’s life just bc of her profession
Within weeks, though, Hales began to see her attacker’s face in the crowd of protesters outside the Raleigh clinic. At first, she thought she was being paranoid. But then, she says, the protesters began to yell things they hadn’t yelled before, echoing words said to her during the assault.
“The protesters outside started calling me a jezebel a lot more,” Hales said. “And I got letters in the mail saying that I deserved it.”
They also said things they could have known only from talking to her attacker or seeing her rape kit. Hales has a tattoo of a serotonin molecule on her left rib and one day, a protester asked what molecule her tattoo was of.
Hales received a barrage of anonymous text messages, phone calls, and voicemails. She’d pick up the phone and hear someone breathing heavily. She’d get voicemails that said, “Do you remember it?” Some days, she received hundreds of blank text messages. One night while at dinner with friends, she got a text from an unknown number that said, “That shirt looks pretty on you.”
This wasn’t a “lone wolf” – this was a fully accepted member of the local “pro-life” community and instead of being horrified or disgusted by his actions they cheered him on and celebrated what he did.
Let that sink in: these “protesters” are supporting this rapist. They know the graphic details of the rape and they are giddy about being able to traumatize her further through stalking and harassment.
Well, misogyny is the driving force behind the “pro-life” movement. And to anyone who wants to say “but a lot of women are pro-life”—so? Systemic misogyny involves a contrast between “bad” women and “good” women, and the “good” women are the ones who buy into the system and help enforce the sanctions it imposes on “bad” women. Women slut-shame other women; women perpetuate the fetishization and essentialization of motherhood and shame other women for failing to live up to its impossible standards. Women can absolutely be misogynistic and suffer no cognitive dissonance because they assume that they are among “the good ones,” the ones rewarded by the system, and it is only the bad women who step out of their place whom they despise.
(Lewis’s Law states that the comments on any article about feminism will justify the need for feminism.)
So today someone posts a thing about how it’s hard to talk to men about issues that affect primarily women.
And this dude responds saying he doesn’t think this is a real problem that women experience:
Apparently without irony. So of course he gets the response:
Not getting it:
STILL NOT GETTING IT:
Does he get it yet? Nope:
He goes through this ENTIRE EXCHANGE without realizing that he is demonstrating the exact issue being discussed. I’m still not sure he understands what’s going on, despite multiple people trying to explain it to him. It’s just… this is a work of art. It’s mansplaining all the way down.
Imagine being in a relationship in which you are treated like an equal, consciously and unconsciously, sexually, emotionally, socially, romantically, without being bound by gender expectations, without risk of pregnancy (or having your reproductive rights taken away from you), without feelings of inferiority, without being mistreated or neglected because men don’t understand your body and can’t be bothered to learn how to give you pleasure (or that you even deserve pleasure). Imagine having a reciprocating relationship with someone who knows how to touch you and how to talk to you, who will never abuse you or take away your consent. Imaging feeling powerful, safe, like the default rather than the specific or second-class. Imagine not requiring special handling by awkward, inconsiderate men who were never taught any better. Imagine being allowed to touch and enjoy and indulge without apprehension. Imagine being able to trust your partner. Imagine knowledge and understanding, someone who sees your depths and treats you the way you’d treat yourself if you hadn’t been told from birth that you weren’t worth it.
Girls aren’t “making them gay.”
Girls are fantasizing about being equal.
I have wondering about this in fandom for many years and reading this just made me tear up. I figured this was a big reason, but breaking it down to this extent made me so extremely sad. I realized a long time ago that even if I met the nicest guy in the world, I still have to battle all those things mentioned above. Just being friends is hard. I don’t have a happy history in this area like a lot of women and I have major trust issues with men and I wish somehow that wall could be broken down and we could all truly be seen as equal…as people with value. If you have all of the above with someone of the opposite sex then you are really lucky. See women are expected to give all those things listed above and settle for not getting them in return. I believe it’s a rare thing if you have it returned. Like I said, if I was with the nicest guy in the world I will always doubt myself, think he see’s me as different, talk to me different… Why? Because that’s our experience. This world raises us to believe we are worth absolutely nothing. The idea of being equal is one of our greatest fantasies.
It’s sad that it has to be a fantasy.
It’s totally sad.
But on the other hand, slash writers are some of the most empathetic people I know. And they’re great educators, too, probably in ways they might not expect. A good slash fanfiction writer can help women understand their desires and overcome some of those feelings of shame and worthlessness.
Think about how many girls have learned how to masturbate thanks to slash fanfiction.
Sometimes just knowing that we’re all reading and enjoying the stories is an immense comfort. People will tell you that slash is trash, that fangirls are desperate and pathetic, but ladies telling ladies that they’re allowed is a powerful thing.
Yeah, oh man. This is. Yeah, this is a lot. I especially feel the taboo surrounding female sexuality to the point that even though I’m Pretty Gay myself, I’m uncomfortable with my own sexuality (not as in orientation) and also dealing with the sexuality of other women. Like in some ways, I am always hesitant to appreciate sexiness in women because we are almost never shown female sexuality in a safe, respectful, and equal way and it still freaks me out.
I will never forget — and I wish so *badly* I still had a copy — the essay one of my exes wrote before she gafiated, in which she talked about how the act of writing slash and being part of the slash community in general had allowed her to “write herself back into her body”.
To, essentially, take off some of the blinders and filters western culture had put on her, all the things that had convinced her that, as an “overtall, fat, awkward, anxious, and altogether unattractive” person (she did have some anxiety issues, but none of the rest was true by any measure but all the lies we’ve ALL been told), she deserved neither happiness, nor romance, nor anything resembling sexual parity or satisfaction.
We met through fandom — she later told me she’d been quietly lurking on my mailing lists and around my websites for two years before she ever actually spoke to me — and we had four good years together before our relationship started to fall apart.
And, while not all of our happiness — together and separately — can be laid at the feet of the various slash goddesses, quite a lot of it can be.
Slash wrote *me* back into my body, too — several times, in several ways. Slash connected me to genders I never could’ve imagined, or could’ve imagined being *worth* connecting to in the days before I really understood the possibilities inherent to taking the media I had been given and *transforming* it.
We are *here*, and our pleasure is worth it — our pleasures, plural, are part and parcel of our identities.
And, you know, some of us, after we’ve been writing slash for a good, long while?
Find new ways to express those pleasures when women are there, new ways to understand those aspects of our sexualities — our *identities* — which include *hetero*sexuality.
It’s a journey. A process. A continuum. A spectrum. A *multiverse*.
AAAAAH! Thank you so much @dirtydirtychai !! It’s always a joy when someone’s writing about the psychology of fanfic gets back out into public circulation. We need these essays – they are part of our history and part of our validation.
Thank you 🙂
women deserve sexual pleasure. the fact that this is a controversial statement is at the heart of why slash is so popular with women AND why there’s no shortage of crusaders ready to explain (with horrible enthusiasm) that it ‘shouldn’t’ be.
Reblogging for the article link..I may not agree with all the comments in the thread but the article is sound and on point even 15 years later. Well thought through and incredibly articulate. I think in the light of all the shit finally being made public about sexual harassment it’s even more relevant. Slash is a safe place to explore without censure and you can stop when it becomes uncomfortable.
The thing about this is that sculptures like these in art history were for the male gaze. Photoshop a phone to it and suddenly she’s seen as vain and conceited. That’s why I’m 100% for selfie culture because apparently men can gawk at women but when we realize how beautiful we are we’re suddenly full of ourselves…
“You painted a naked woman because you enjoyed looking at her, put a mirror in her hand and you called the painting “Vanity,” thus morally condemning the woman whose nakedness you had depicted for you own pleasure.” ― John Berger, Ways of Seeing
I know I’ve reblogged this before but it’s so important.
A majority of millennial men failed to see women as equals, according to the study, which looked at how college biology students viewed their classmates’ intelligence and achievements, the Harvard Business Review reported.
Among the findings:
In every biology class surveyed, a man was seen as the most celebrated student, even in instances where women earned significantly better grades.
Men were also found to overestimate the intelligence of their male classmates over that of female ones.
Men continued exaggerating their assessments of the male peers, despite unequivocal evidence that their female peers were performing better.
Women, conversely, weren’t found to display a bias: Their assessments of fellow classmates tended to be spot-on.
The National Institutes of Health researchers pointed out that female STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) majors drop out at significantly higher rates than their male counterparts.
“The reasons for this difference are complex, and one possible contributing factor is the social environment women experience in the classroom,” they wrote.
Still, scores of men are under the impression that they’ve become the target of reverse sexism. Conservative columnist John Hawkins ranted in Town Hall last year:
“Men have it rougher in America than most people realize. In part, that’s because they’re one of the few groups (along with white people, conservatives, and Christians) it’s cool to crap on at every opportunity. In case you haven’t noticed, there’s a nonstop assault on masculinity in America.”
But research has confirmed the reality of gender bias against women. A staggering 90 percent of women reported experiencing gender harassment in the workplace, a 2010 University of Michigan study found. The results suggest that such harassment had the purpose of driving women out of jobs and not the generally assumed motivation of trying to draw women into relationships.
“One could argue that, in these instances, ‘sexual harassment is used both to police and discipline the gender outlaw: the woman who dares to do a man’s job is made to pay,’” the researchers wrote, quoting an article by Katherine M. Franke, an associate professor of law at the University of Arizona College of Law.
As for millennial men specifically, they have been less accepting of female leaders than their older male counterparts, according to a 2014 survey of more than 2,000 adults residing in the United States, the Harvard Business Review reports.
Half of Millenial men said their careers would take priority over their partners’.
Three-fourths of women, on the other hand, said their careers would be at least as important as their husbands’.
oh look its the shit women have been saying all the damn time and antifeminists stamp their feet and cry about
Yikes
Scientific studies confirming these issues aren’t new or rare yet said issues are still denied most fiercely by people who claim to just be “logical.”
interesting how so many people will agree that “mothering is the hardest/most intense/most important job in the world” but the people who perform the work of mothering for money (daycare workers and nannies) are payed shit wages and nobody cares. it’s almost as if we glorify motherhood to convince women to have children but actually consider the gendered work of caretaking to be worth next to nothing.
i thought you guys would find this thread i wrote interesting
this is a very real problem! and unfortunately, something similar happens to people of color and adults as well. always try and tie it down to something else when, in fact, the disorder has been clearly present the whole time. it’s so damaging.
“Study: Female-initiated disruption of a male hierarchy incites hostile behaviour from poor performing males who stand to lose the most status: Poorly performing males are hostile toward a female teammate but submissive toward a male teammate.”
the stereotype that women talk more than men is infinitely amusing to me because men are literally incapable of shutting the fuck up
i hope this post gets popular enough that i hurt a man’s feelings
It’s not a stereotype it’s a proven fact you femanazi piece of shit.
lmao there it is
You wanna talk proven facts? This shit’s been done, son: researcher Dale Spencer in Australia used audio and video tape to independently evaluate who talked the most in mixed-gender university classroom discussions. Regardless of the gender ratio of the students, whether the instructor was deliberately trying to encourage female participation or not, men always talked more—whether the metric was minutes of talking or number of words spoken.
Moreover, men literally have no clue how much they talk. When Spencer asked students to evaluate their perception of who talked more in a given discussion, women were pretty accurate; but men perceived the discussion as being “equal” when women talked only 15% of the time, and the discussion as being dominated by women if they talked only 30% of the time.
Spencer’s conclusion, if I may parahprase: you only think we talk too much because you’d rather we were silent.
Don’t fuck with me, asshole, I’m a scientist.
This reminds me of that figure about crowd scenes in movies – I can only find the one saying that women make up about 17% of movie crowds (here’s that and more depressing statistics), but I thought I remembered reading that when women made up more than 30% of the crowd, (male?) viewers perceived the crowd as being more than half women.
Loki is the Philosopher King 