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by SteelRigged, for http://www.janesdueprocess.org/ I spent my first year as a law student helping teenagers get abortions. I worked the phones at a small non-profit called Jane’s Due Process, which as far as I know, is the only organization in the country that helps teens navigate the judicial bypass process to get abortions without parental consent or notification. (You should Google it and make a donation right now.)
I helped teenagers get secret abortions
Is the ‘F’ word co-opted by conservatives & consumerist media? Where are real icons & core values? On The Issues Magazine, Winter 2011, considers feminist icons, feminist values and feminist cons.
The Rise of Enlightened Sexism
I've been thinking about homosociality a bit these past few days. Homosociality (as explained so well in Michael Kimmel's Manhood in America) is the principle that all men, including heterosexual ones, are raised in our culture to be more eager to please other men than women. It doesn't take much in my classes to get heads nodding as the subject comes up! To use one cheap and easy example, homosociality explains the function of catcalls and wolf whistles.
Homosociality
Rape culture is a concept used to describe a culture in which rape and sexual violence are common and in which prevalent attitudes , norms , practices, and media normalize , excuse, tolerate, or even condone rape. Examples of behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming , sexual objectification , and trivializing rape. Rape culture has been used to model behavior within social groups, including prison systems where prison rape is common and conflict areas where war rape is used as psychological warfare. Entire countries have also been alleged to be rape cultures. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ] [ 5 ] Although the concept of rape culture is a generally accepted theory in feminist academia, [ 6 ] there is disagreement over what defines a rape culture and to what degree a given society meets the criteria to be considered a rape culture. Rape culture has been observed to correlate with other social factors and behaviors.
Rape Culture
Men Who Explain Things
April 13, 2008 | Rebecca Solnit | Rebecca Solnit is the author of many books including "A Field Guide to Getting Lost," "River of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West" and "Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities." A longer version of this article appears at Tomdispatch.com. I still don't know why Sallie and I bothered to go to that party in the forest slope above Aspen. The people were all older than us and dull in a distinguished way, old enough that we, at 40-ish, passed as the occasion's young ladies. The house in Colorado was great -- if you like Ralph Lauren-style chalets: a rugged luxury cabin at 9,000 feet, complete with elk antlers, lots of kilims, and a wood-burning stove.
Third-Wave Feminism
1. There must be a widespread understanding that feminism does apply to men. Therefore, men who stand up for feminist issues may, and should, be identified as feminist. It is counterproductive and hypocritical to discuss gender equality while simultaneously creating a double standard towards males who share feminist values.
“I’ve never really understood feminism,” begins Chelsea Fagan’s Thought Catalog essay about the recent ‘Slutwalk’ protest in Toronto. “No shit you don’t,” I found myself thinking when I was done reading it. In her essay, Fagan explains why she disapproves of the Slutwalk , a protest against comments made by a Toronto law enforcement officer who said that women who don’t want to be assaulted, raped or otherwise “victimized” should avoid dressing “like sluts.” She also completely misses the point of the protest, engages in some spectacular victim-blaming and demonstrates beyond a shadow of a doubt that no, she does not understand feminism. The basic argument of “The Funny Thing About the ‘Slutwalk,’” is that if a woman is raped while wearing something “slutty,” she should take some responsibility for what happened to her, because she ought to have known better than to dress that way.
Victim-blaming
That’s the argument put forward by Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam, writing in Psychology Today (thanks, Ariana, for the link). They start off here: One sexual enigma perplexes both women and their clinicians: Why do so many American women have difficulties in bed?
Feminism makes boners sad.
Helpful Hints for Dudes
Sometimes, and rather frequently in recent weeks, privileged men (here, generally meaning straight cis men) email me asking advice on how to interact with the women in their lives.This is, I think, an important post. I’ve been thinking about men in women’s studies classes, and jokes about "male-bashing." This semester’s women’s studies class is like most: overwhelmingly female.
Defusing feminist anger