Inspired

Today while perusing my facebook feed I saw a link to a note written by a Georgetown University student, titled For those who think I rant about the patriarchy and misogyny too much, and it was as if the collective sigh of all women had just resoundingly echoed off the walls of the internet. Guys who I tell about this kind of stuff roll their eyes or laugh at me when I say it is hard being female. That you are expected to not just take this kind of stuff, but take it with a polite smile and “yes please, thank you.”I wish the picture she included could have said more when it already said so much. We are socialized to accept being groped, to feel bad about rejecting men who touch us without asking, to couple the word “no” with an apology.

After reading this, I encourage all women to share their stories. As I will do mine.

To the males undoubtedly in the thousands who have touched me without asking me in the bars and clubs. Who have felt the need to grab my ass simply because it is there. To the guy in Cleveland in 2005 who said he had a right to grab my ass because it was 80s night and he could do whatever he wanted. To the guys who think that dancing with me entails grabbing me and pulling me towards them. Who kept doing so despite me saying VERY politely “no thank you!” To the guy at Beauty Bar a month ago who told me he “hated” my bubble, and kept trying to touch me regardless, and proceeded to watch me dancing for the next 30 minutes. To the guy at Beauty Bar last night who didn’t ask to dance but just grabbed my side, felt me up and tried to pull me over and after 27 years I finally snapped and said “you don’t need to touch me.”

To the guys who I have complained about being touched in this manner at bars and asked me “what else do you expect?” or even told me I brought it upon myself by simply BEING in that atmosphere. Who have the liberty of merely BEING at a bar without being touched, god forbid they want to go out and enjoy some music or being social.

To the guys driving past my friends and I when 13, 14, 15, honking and making comments about how they’d fuck us, even the “fat ones.”

To the males well into their 30s, 40s who came up to me when I was 12-16 at the mall and told me how much prettier I would be if I smiled.

To the guy I met out here when I first got my own place and thought would be a cool friend, but put me on such a high pedestal with such tenacity it scared me. Who after asking me if I had broken up with my boyfriend, because he wanted to take me out and treat me right, I never responded to again.

To all the guys who put me on a pedestal because I’m a girl. Who made me an object to admire rather than just another human being who has bad habits and sometimes doesn’t shower for days and takes shits and is passionate for the work she does and has interests and creates things.

To the guy who told me he pretends to be gay at bars so he can grind closely on women and touch them, and then proceeded to whisper all the things he “wants to do me” in my ear as I scanned the room frantically for my friends.

To the guy who said he would walk me home after a party where I had drank too much and told me he needed to make a stop at his dorm to go to the bathroom and then locked me in his dorm, made me strip down to my underwear and wouldn’t let me leave til morning, when he took me to my dorm and dropped me off, saying I was now his pet and I was allowed to have 30 minutes to find a change of clothes and shower and he would come back to get me. Who I didn’t tell the right dorm building so he didn’t know where I lived. Who finally forced me to get a cellphone because he found my dorm number on the university directory and called every couple hours so I had to unplug my phone.

To all the guys at parties who told me they “claim” me for the night, and wonder where I disappear to later.

To the guy I met out here for drinks because I still didn’t have friends, and came to my house and in the middle of me talking to him shoved his tongue in my mouth and I for some reason politely just kept stopping instead of just saying no. Who I told I had to go to bed and he could crash on my couch woke me up by putting his hands in my pants.

To the other guy who I met for drinks and agreed with me he just was looking for friends, but then after I drank only 2 beers too quickly and vomited, had sex with me, and I haven’t yet admitted it to anyone because I was ashamed I let it happen to me again.

To the first guy who did that to me, who was someone I considered a very close friend, who after I blacked out decided to use my body like the object it was and have sex with it, and I had no idea it even happened until a month later I discovered I was pregnant.

To the guy in Columbus who drugged my drink and could have done much worse if my friends hadn’t showed up at that moment.

To the guys who I told about my rape and got angry and wanted to beat up the guy who did it, because I was some defenseless creature who needed protected. To those guys who want to beat up rapists but not do anything when they see a drunk girl being hit on on the street corner or falling off her barstool.

To all the guys who have tried following me me home in my college town.

To all the guys who think rape jokes are funny because it doesn’t happen to men, and men who it does happen to must not have been real men.

To all the males in my life who have called me “irrational” for getting upset when they were acting terrible.

To anyone who thinks I brought all of this on myself for coming out of my mother a female. As if I had some choice, and if I did, it was the wrong one.

Other observations

Trying keep posts relative to one major idea, so here are some other ramblings that didn’t quite fit in with the last one.

1)What the feminist movement NEEDS (hint, it’s only one word): Respect

I think we are still at a point of mixed ideologies, mixed messages, mixed intents, and a real mixed crowd (on both the feminist and anti-feminist spectrum). Many people, I myself once being one, are the type who think they are anti feminist because they have listened to way too many conflicting accounts of what feminism is according to popular media. There are those who are feminist but do not uphold the ideas that we should be reaching out to EVERYONE. There are those who may call themselves feminist but still think a woman’s place is the home. There are those who may call themselves feminists but want men to be below women. There are those who are just flat out anti-feminist.

So let’s get one thing clear: Feminism does not want to kill all your babies. Feminism does not want to wear tiny skirts. Feminism does not hate men. Feminism does not want to complain. Feminism does not want to falsely accuse you of rape.

Feminism wants to love everyone, whether that entails single moms, war veterans, politicians (hard I know), girls, boys, women, men, transgendered individuals, homemakers, ballbusting career-ladies, strangers, neighbors, and above all, YOU!

2)There is still posturing in feminism (looking good with words and signs but not actually reaching out) which is kind of a bummer. Granted, a lot of people can’t be involved as they want to be. And some are genuinely behind it but just, aren’t active. And that’s cool. But prominent feminists, you have the power to really do well! You can write a million snarky blogs (lulz) but it’s not going to really DO much. Volunteer, make art, make music, start support groups, start feminist groups, make zines, make collaborative zines, do research, do studies, I don’t know! It’s pretty limitless. If you are high profile, reach out to others, don’t sit in your den of smarm and expect people to be willing to go along with you. Grassroots that shit!

3)Protests: is it me or do they not seem to work? Walks and vigils and information distribution are all tight, but protests really seem to turn people off. And of course, they really do NOT clear the false idea that feminists/women are hysterical or oversensitive. There is definitely a line between being assertive and aggressive. Avoiding protests doesn’t seem anti-assertive to me, just, I guess more approachable. As women we are socialized to not be assertive so the idea of eschewing such behavior is disturbing, so I am definitely not saying that.

Maybe it’s just because I am shy, but I feel like there are more creative ways to relay our message. I’m not really providing options here I realize, but that’s because I am still thinking of some. Maybe protests that are more like happy gatherings? I went to one in Youngstown where we mostly chanted some cheers with big smiles, which made me less uncomfortable than protests usually make me. I’ll think about it. We definitely need to get angry, but at the right people. Attacking the general public with yelling and angry signs is a little misguided to me. We need to save the yelling for the politicians who are way more deserving a tongue lashing.

4)Doods with a white male persecution complex. Number one: stop making everything about you. Number two: stop making everything about you. The fact that terms like “reverse discrimination” and mentalities like “child support is just a woman’s way to control you” exist prove that some guys need to please stop being 13. As feminists we are not just interested in men’s behavior but our own. While a patriarchal society is responsible for a lot of the discrimination women and other minorities face, as human beings we are no longer in the “child phase” of humanity. We’ve come a long way. We’ve discovered cures for diseases. And that the earth isn’t flat! I think it’s safe to assume we can be smart enough to know that letting our little boys play with Barbies and letting our little girls climb trees isn’t going to kill them or bring the world apocalypse. Therefore at this point women are just as culpable for what goes on. We either stay silent or even lend a harsh word to our fellow woman. In an essence, feminism is not about attacking YOU but learning to respect everyone, even other women (crazy I know).

Child support is not a way for a money hungry girl to ensnare you, it’s a way for you to take dual responsibility for you sticking your dick in a girl. Provided she consented, you are both responsible for the results. Hopefully you love the shit out of the results, but if not, you at least help her as she tries to get her child through life.

Asking you to realize rape is wrong is not “crazy feminism,” it’s uhhhh being a human being. One thing we champion over our animalistic desires of sex, intoxication and violence is a BRAIN. With that brain comes compassion for those who share this existence with us. Hopefully. That’s not so crazy, is it? That you ask us for permission because maybe it can turn into a very nice consensual relationship, or at the very least, a very nice consensual orgasm. Believe me, there are tons of people who want to get laid. There is someone for everyone. You don’t need to wait for a girl to get drunk.

5) Meanwhile in Ohio, bullshit like this happens under our noses:

OH Budget, with Anti-Abortion Amendments, Passes Senate Committee

I’m terrible

At updating, it seems.

I do have a lot to say, and sometimes I guess maybe too much. Though, is there too much on feminist rhetoric when women are still valued in the workplace/academic field/relationships/etc as inferior to men? When we have trouble communicating with ourselves AND men? When we fail to recognize there are more than men and women in the big picture of equal rights?

I guess not. But being concise definitely helps. Especially when, as cliche as it is to note, our society has an ever shortening attention span. Blah blah blah.

A lot upsets me these days, different observations, different realizations, different conclusions drawn from all of it. Maybe I’m just a “no fun feminist.” Considering getting a shirt that says that. But honestly, I’d like to think I am a lot of fun, I just don’t see how marginalizing women is fun. It’s destructive, hurtful, and potentially dangerous (alarmist, I know).

Take for example, if you can spare the I think 8 minutes, this video.

The idea of being feminine ie a woman is SO repulsive that young boys say they’d rather DIE than be compared to one. The message we are forcing into our young boys’ heads is that women are 100% worthless: if being one is so demeaning, then we certainly shouldn’t value them. There is NO other way around that. There is no defending this mentality. “Well, uh, I mean being a man is about being strong, women have the nice sensitive side.” No, being a man is about respecting your fellow kind. No matter if your fellow kind is a strong woman, a sensitive man, an outgoing transgender, a shy asexual, yadda yadda yadda. And everyone in between.

The dual evil of making women have zero value all the while making men feel ashamed of their emotions is probably the biggest wedge driven between the feminist movement and progress. To quote a favorite movie “To be ashamed of FEELING, now that is the killer.” How much more could be accomplished if we were all allowed to FEEL.

See also, this video. It just about sums up how destructive gender roles can be: a man made to feel uncomfortable in his own body at the fragile age of FIVE attempts to live with himself and finally gives up at 38. Like his sister said, she had no idea how he even made it that far. And there are many many many more children subjected to the experiments of Rekers and his colleagues.

I could go on forever with other examples as to how these restrictive social constructs hurt us much more than help, such as rape apologists, gay bullying, transgender bullying, and so on. We are attacking FELLOW HUMAN BEINGS for mere differences or the idea that one group is SUPPOSED to have dominance over another.

As a feminist I ask: is it too much to want to be a human being?

Wuff

Okay, now that I have all THAT off my chest, time for more ranting and logic, less emotion. Well, okay, still emotion, but not as personal.

Number one, sorry for the gap. I have a fulltime job, I am trying to start my own online business (dreadfully slowly for sure), I parttime DJ, I make art, and often when I get home from the fulltime job, I’m busy on errands or plain beat.

That’s life. I am trying to cut out more time for political/personal blogging and trying to get back to music blogging (thus me booking a new wordpress domain, hotknees.wordpress.com, trying to distance myself from my Blogspot music blog). I am trying to do less “internetting” and more meaningful internet ventures, such as keeping up to date on everything that is happening women/social rights-wise, blogging, etc. Internetting meaning sitting on Facebook, Twitter and Gmail and constantly toggling between the three hitting refresh and forcing myself to look at music blogs. I once blocked all television/movie sites and Facebook and Twitter, but I removed the block when I didn’t feel it necessary anymore. Welp, being bummed about everything going on lately is making me go on the apathetic mope around on the internet front again, and that needs to stop.

In other words, I bet Republicans looooooove Facebook.

But don’t think that I think that blogging and reading blogs is going to make me a better person. That’s another part of why I have been so busy. Being a better person! I have so far 1)joined the Pro-Choice Escorts and starting April will be escorting young scared girls away from screaming, terrifying idiots 2)Displayed art/read poetry in a Women’s History Month art show 3)Participated in an anti Anti-Abortion Bill/anti SB5 march/protest 4)Contacted women about a larger, Northeast Ohio coalition of women standing up for our rights

Writing that out makes it seem a lot more trivial, and I guess it is.  I’d really like to do more. I have phone numbers, I need to call them. So that’s what’s been up with me.

Number two, I have many planned rants, and unfortunately it is late and I have work at 7am. But I do intend to write everything down here again. So much has happened in the last month, politically. Most of it has made me so disenfranchised. Most of it has made me lose whatever tiny shred of faith I had left for our country, a slide that began a long long time ago.

But there is still something there, I don’t think it is so much faith as it is sheer stupidity that I can make a change. So here I am, trying.

I’m Losing Faith

Ohio House Panel OKs Anti-Abortion Heartbeat Bill

Six weeks. Six fucking weeks. Six tiny, miserable fucking weeks. That’s all it takes for a human fetus to develop the pre-inklings of a life, a heartbeat. A brainless, senseless, not yet human child heartbeat. It usually takes just four to even realize you are pregnant.

That’s how long it took me.

Imagine, if you will, being an irresponsible twenty something girl with no cares in the world. I mean, it’s spoiled and American, but just imagine it. Imagine, in this scenario, that you’ve had a few suitors. It happens. It’s a learning process. But now imagine that you haven’t been irresponsible, sexually, in months. That instead of that, you’ve decided to abstain from sex. Completely. You kiss here and there, but draw the line. Put yourself in that fucking place when you realize there is something wrong with your body you’ve never experienced before. Everything is off and you have no idea why or how, but somehow your body just KNOWS what you need to do. So you get a pregnancy test.

So you imagine, now, that you are a twentysomething girl who just looked at a piss-stick that told her she is pregnant, when she only had her period a few weeks ago. You put away your sanctimonious high horse in the barn and you IMAGINE reading a pregnancy test telling you you are pregnant and you have NO idea how. Tell me what that feels like, because I still don’t have words for it. I never will. Never.

Two years ago to the date, that was my life. I stared at a wall for ten minutes until my best friend and roommate came in to ask me a question and saw the stick and my face. That ten minutes I was scraping every bit of data, every tiny memory out of my brain, picking up every vague whiff of a recollection by the collar and shaking it while screaming “HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?” She asked me “Oh that’s not…is it?” and I cried. I just cried.

I had to put together events, scrambled events. A guy, a friend, someone I trusted, who’d come over and we’d drink or not drink and watch TV shows and pass out in my bed. One time I woke up with less clothes than expected and I STILL trusted him. He promised me nothing happened. I know you’d say how could you be so stupid? But he was a trusted friend. Why should I think a friend would rape me while passed out drunk? Why would anyone think that? So I immediately wiped it from my mind.

At the point I took the test, it was almost four weeks. Time passed too quickly in between managing to get him to give me a tiny portion of the money, getting off work, getting a clinic pregnancy test, getting off more work, signing a consent form, getting off even more work, getting the procedure. I was barely six weeks. And six weeks, I was informed, was when they become safer, more sure. At the time an abortion becomes it’s safest until a second trimester and beyond, is when they will be considered to be illegal in the great fucking state of Ohio if this monstrosity of a bill passes.

And six weeks, when I finally was able to terminate, if it were today, two years later, I would be forced to keep the child of a rapist. I would be forced to raise a child in a home where, deep down, I would not want it. Above all, a child knows when it is not wanted. Why for fuck’s sake would I want to do that to a child? Why would I let a fetus develop into a human, be born, and go through life never knowing their father was not even the bottomfeeding scum of the ocean? And, when they finally did find out (because that will, guaranteed, no matter how much I would hide the fact, be found out), how happy do you think that child would be to learn not only was I not wanting a child, but it was forced on me while sleeping? That I had no recollection of conceiving? That the last thing I remember about that night was telling a guyfriend “Hey I don’t want to watch anything tonight, the room is spinning so let’s just go to bed.” More cruel than stopping life BEFORE it begins is letting it happen under such terrible circumstances.

I don’t regret my termination. I NEVER ever will. Do I have remorse? Of course. It’s an intangible, unintelligible remorse. It isn’t feeling bad or guilty I terminated, it’s just a sadness, more associated with the rape. Not knowing is what killed me. And will continue to kill me for the rest of my life.

This is all INSANELY personal, but I have a personal investment in the future of women’s rights, and I can’t be ashamed to admit that. I lived through what no female should ever have to, so I have made it my life goal to make sure no more females have to.

They’re back!

They are back at it again. I was hoping they were done.

The protesters are back at Planned Parenthood on Cleveland in Canton. Probably having a field day. Fuck, of all the things the government can cut funding on, Planned Parenthood is one of the very last. It’s making me pretty stressed out these days. And bummed.

What I’d like to do is start a feminist group in Canton but I fear most women in the Stark County area idolize Sarah Palin and Michelle Malkin. The worst representatives of our gender. I just don’t know where I’d start, as far as publicity goes. Guess I’ll ask around.

I’d also like to hear the conservatives argument against abortion WITHOUT invoking religion (better than Douthat’s meager “the optimist clause” debate). If they would like the government to abolish Planned Parenthood and regulate/abolish abortion they need to leave religion out of it because, if you remember, we ARE a secular nation. Basing laws and bills around your theology is not in our constitution, sorry.

Well, ideally. But I remember something my awesome (weird to say but true!) dentist dentist said about GW winning a second time, prior to his election. “George Bush is going to win, and he is going to win for three reasons. G O D.” When did Americans forget the very notion upon which this country was sought after and founded? So we didn’t have to deal with bullshit like this, people trying to control our religious and personal freedoms.

Frustrating doesn’t begin to describe what every feminist is feeling right now.

In other more optimistic news, here’s a very pretty song (hypem link):

Body Language – Social Studies

Interesting recent links

Both from my new favorite feminist, Amanda Marcotte:

Texas Legislators Fight Back with Pointed Amendments

Here’s a bit of background: Texas is attempting to pass a law that says a woman wanting an abortion must first be forced to look at her ultrasound then “go home and think about it.” I mean, Planned Parenthood already gives you “go home and think about it” time in the time between signing the consent form with the doctor (who strong urges you to consider adoption, all the while) and the procedure, at least 24 hours. But fuck does this make ANYone else think of “now you sit in the corner young lady and think about what you’ve done!” kind of chastising as if we are slatternly 10 again? A few Texas legislators (God bless their hearts) are now trying to add amendments onto the bill making note that “well yes fine make the woman barely scraping by on welfare keep the baby, but if you must, you might as well pay for it for the rest of your life since you are SO concerned about its wellbeing.” Of course anti-choicers don’t give a shit about the baby’s wellbeing, as Marcotte points out, they just want to make sure the girl in questions knows she “done wrong.”

The Monogamy-Ladyjoy Correlation

Amanda Marcotte’s rebuttal to Ross Douthat’s NYTimes editorial that we fighting for Planned Parenthood are not optimistic for women but the opposite. We are just a bunch of grumpy goats who’d like women to never be in a happy monogamous relationship. Because we all know happiness stems purely from a monogamous relationship WITH A MAN. Yes, conservatives are being the optimistic ones in saying that relationships in which we explore ourselves sexually before marriage will almost undeniably fail because we didn’t wait.

I’d like to expound upon both these links, but I have a boyfriend to pick up.

Feel free to open discussion!

The F Word: My Feminist Perspective

How hard is it these days to have legitimate complaints about the government trying to marginalize what “rape” is or remove funding for an organization that has saved my life (mostly figurative, one literal case) multiple times? How hard is it to openly talk to people about how abortion is largely misconstrued and a skewed issue? How hard is it to just say “I’m a feminist” anymore?

Apparently very. For a nation that in only 50 years made awesomely huge strides towards women’s social/economical/political equality, we’ve somehow gone quickly backwards the last 10 years. To the point that, as my best friend and I have often duly noted, it feels like saying feminist is a worse F word than fuck.

To wit: We had a unofficial offcampus feminist group for a short while, and when trying to recruit members we set up a table during the freshman orientation in the cafeteria. The amount of people who went from very interested to straight up walking away after hearing “feminist” outnumbered those who weren’t scared off by it greatly. And that’s from fellow females too.

Feminism is not about bitching. It’s not about being a “feminazi” and hating all men. We don’t think there is anything wrong with dressing cute and wearing makeup. If that’s what you like, fuck, do it. We love doing what makes us happy. If we don’t shave our legs, it’s not for some stand, it’s because we don’t think we are getting laid or it’s too damn cold. We don’t burn our bras and in fact, (I don’t speak for all feminists or women at all actually on this one) I love wearing a bra. I love wearing dresses and mascara and cute things.

That feminism would be concerned with things so trivial is insulting, really. When people think of us, they think of ugly chicks who just hate anything girly. There are much bigger things on our agenda, and frankly no one could give two fucks what you wear. It’s how you treat females that matters. Feminism simply is, and will always be until we get there, equality for all genders in all classes. Being equal! That’s it! Crazy right? If you’re a female, hug another female! If you’re male, respect a female not because of chivalry, do it because she’s another human being, just like you!

What we (maybe just I, but pretty sure we) want is a new wave of feminism. Something to bring us closer to equality. Something that stops society from punishing us for not wanting to be barefoot and pregnant instead of in the workforce. Something that makes us respect and love each other, as females. Something that makes us respect and love each other, as humans.

Something that makes it okay to say “I’m a feminist.”