I gotta clear a couple things up. I’m afraid that what follows is something in the nature of a pontification. Just so you know what you’re getting into, here’s a synopsis:
I. I reveal the true nature of the ‘bad feminist.’
II. Somewhat taken aback by the shoe-centric responses to yesterday’s post on femininity-as-humanitarian-crisis, I pronounce on high heels even as I beg for a moratorium on shoeblogging.
III. I conclude with a conclusion.
You have been warned.
I. “Does XYZ (where XYZ is “wearing lipstick” or “my job as lap-dancer-in-chief at the Bada Bing” or “eating bacon” or “pleasing my man with some humiliating sex move”) make me a bad feminist?”
Women, it seems, are anxious that feminism should be synonymous with “status quo”; lately this question has been observed springing from computer monitors across the galaxy like hookers from stag party cakes.
The answer to the question is “no”. Doing XYZ (i.e. femininity) does not make you a bad feminist. A bad feminist is someone who pulls wings off flies, promises to take the kid to Disneyland but gets drunk instead, gives LSD to the dog, bombs abortion clinics, steals from grandma to buy dope, forces men at gunpoint to put women’s underwear on their heads, etc.
Doing XYZ merely makes you a hypocrite.
Unless you were some kinda misogynist wingnut to begin with, in which case it just makes you an asshole race-traitor.
II. High heels
I am reluctant to devote much more of my rapidly waning intellect to so fluffy a topic as women’s sexbot footwear, but, dang it, I can’t take it any more.
Look, claiming to love your high heels because they appeal to you in some comprehensively objective, lofty aesthetic sense, separated by a million brilliant intellectual miles from the culture of femininity that spawned’em, is a cop out. Even if it’s the fine workmanship you admire, you must admit that the expertise — however refined or inspired — required to cobble leather into an object designed specifically to beautify oppression is merely a skill, and is altogether a separate proposition from the object itself. You may “love” your shoes — you may even defend them as art — but you do this because to your expert eye they so precisely articulate the intricate and famously elusive ideals of femininity, not because they in any way ennoble the human spirit. Your exquisite pumps may represent some pinnacle of design, but the standards by which their exquisiteness are judged can only exist within the context of patriarchy. No, no! Don’t try to deny it. You know I’m right.
Jesus, what is it about shoes? Nah, don’t answer that.
III. Conclusions
A. Women whose continued existence depends on capitulation to the feminine directive will get no argument from me. I often use “survival skill” as a synonym for femininity. The structure of patriarchy, which places anyone with a vagina in a continuum of femininity whether they like it or not, is such that the daily opportunities for self-deception and self-betrayal are mucho, relentless, and — with a frequency that depends on class, skin color, and proximity to domineering male godbags, drunks, and pervs — often unavoidable.
B. Connoisseurship of divine little black silk d’Orsay pumps is not inborn. Culture creates taste.
Bless your cold, bitter heart. You have got it exactly right.
Hypocrites who fall short of their lofty ideals are preferable to hypocrites in denial. That’s my excuse, anyway.
I’m at peace with it all in some overwhelmed and overtired way. But my 3 year old Tess is getting into princesses. I don’t like it; my wife says that she’s not being imprinted with patriarchal archetypes of feminine obedience because she’s too young, but I just don’t like it. Velvet plastic sequin chains in pink and lavender.
I’m thinking high heels are less of a problem than Supposedly Liberal Dude pronouncements like this: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_digbysblog_archive.html#116389524810541064
But possibly I’m just giving MoDo a run for the title of “Queen Bitch.”
Odd, the post glorifying use of terms like “the Heathers” and “Queen Bee” that endorses books about girl bullies that James “Focus on the Family” Dobson also likes (it’s all feminism’s fault!) by Digby seems to have disappeared. Amanda linked to it here: http://pandagon.net/2006/11/25/who-the-hell-wants-to-relive-high-school-anyway/
Maybe it’s an Internet glitch on my end? Sorry for the intrusion, if that is the case. Not sure who to blame… Here is the post Digby linked to at Orcinus with rousing approval: Nope, that seems to be gone too… Possibly I am losing my mind.
“Women whose continued existence depends on capitulation to the feminine directive will get no argument from me.”
Well that’s virtually all women, surely all heterosexual women.
shoeses, shoeses, shoeses the bush kangaroo.
Actually those torture instruments are minor, minor, really. There are traditionally male torture instruments with which I hobble myself. This includes, at the very least, having to keep one’s gloves up when sparring. Compared to wearing torturous shoes all day, keeping you guard up for eight rounds is about three times as painful. Also, there is the issue of navigating the delicate feminine tapestry of social control, which is so unbelievably painful — like pouring burning acid into one’s eyes — that my brain screams, my heart loses its will to pump and the world recedes from me. I will never make another attempt in my life to get along in a workplace which is regulated by delicate feminine mores. I can never see their workings until it becomes painfully obvious that I have violated some petty feature of their protocol and that I will be punished.
scratchy, I can dig it. having worked in retail for what seemed like aeons, the game is confusing with ever-changing rules. my daughter, who now works in a hair salon (talk about your trappings!)reports that it’s an uber-system of retail, where the workings are exaggerated x10 and the consequences of violating them x20.
Thank you for this. Today and yesterday.
I have been reading for a long time but didn’t feel like I had a whole lot I wanted to say after Twisty’s posts were written. Mostly, “Yes. Damn it. Yes.”
But today and yesterday are really great for me.
“B. Connoisseurship of divine little black silk d’Orsay pumps is not inborn. Culture creates taste.”
YES. How is it that this is so difficult for people to understand?
Look, I’m not comfortable with living in the patriarchy, any more than anyone else is. What we do all day is all about survival skills in a system that’s screwing everyone. No one is perfect. No one is a perfect feminist. Whatever that is.
I’m a heel-wearing, makeup-applying, long-haired mostly straight woman. I like skirts. I don’t shave my legs. I paint my nails sometimes. I lift weights and spend my time working on my car stereo, or reading Vogue or watching Sex & the City reruns. Regardless of how any of these things fit into a patriarchal mandate, I am clean with myself about the fact that they do. I think my preferences have a lot to do with my personal taste. But taste isn’t made in a vacuum. Human beings aren’t made in a vacuum. My taste is inextricably linked with the culture(s) I’ve spent time in. The kind of person I am is the direct result of forces outside of me, not my own “free choice” of some kind.
Despite loving shoes and fashion, I am not threatened by Twisty pointing out that neither of these things can be extracted from our patriarchal culture and loved “objectively” for “their intrinsic value.” I can’t think of a single thing that has “intrinsic value” outside of what our culture labels as valuable. What really blows me away is the number of people I’ve seen talking about what Twisty has to say as if it is a personal threat or attack on their heel-wearing “freedom.” Twisty says things that need to be said, loudly and repeatedly, and I for one vote for Twisty-style blaming over others’. (not least for lack of ellipses and a fabulous vocabulary)
I’ve wanted to bring this up before but couldn’t put my finger exactly on it, until the last sentence of today’s post.
So, again, thanks. I needed to yell at my computer screen “YES GOD DAMN IT” for a while now and this helped a lot.
Scratchy:
Please see the FAQ, under the section “But men experience X, too.”
(and my apologies for being tone-deaf if your post was satirical)
“Fashion is a craft, not an industrial, conception, exemplifying to perfection the labor theory of value. The toil of many hands is the *sine qua non* of fashion. The hand of the weaver, the cutter, the fitter, the needleworker must be seen in the finished product in a hundred little details, and fashion knowledge, professionally, consists in the recognition and appreciation of the work that has gone into a costume. In gores and gussets and seams, in the polish of leather and its softness, the signature of painstaking labor must be legible to the discerning, or the woman is not fashionably dressed. The hand-knit sweater is superior to the machine-knit, not because it is more perfect, but on the contrary because its slight imperfections reveal it to be hand-knit. The Oriental pearl is preferred to the fine cultured pearl because the marine labor of a dark diver secured it, a prize wrested from the depths, and the woman who wears Oriental pearls believes that they show variations in temperature or that they change color with her skin or get sick when they are put away in the safe—in short, that they are alive, whereas cultured pearls, mass-stimulated in mass beds of oysters, are not. This sense of the accrued labor of others as a complement to one’s personality, as tribute in a double sense, is intrinsic to the fashionable imagination, which desires to feel that labor next to its skin, in the hidden stitching of its underwear—hence the passion for handmade lingerie even among women whose outer clothing comes off the budget rack.”
—Mary McCarthy, “Up the Ladder from Charm to Vogue” (1950); all emphases in original
Cafe: I’m female, not male.
Nice shoes.
The patriarchal dictates you’re all talking about really aren’t seen here: heels and what goes with them is cultural, and urban. Here, you can go months (years? I can’t think when) and never see a woman wearing high heeled shoes or a skirt or pantyhose. Even in a lawyer’s office downtown. Weather dictates you bundle up or die. Today for example it’s minus 33C with horizonatal snow. Still we don’t escape *it*. Everyone dresses like this, which was the subject of another of Twisty’s posts on partriarchal dictates for women:
http://www.mec.ca/Main/home.jsp?&google=mountain equipment co-op
“Jesus, what is it about shoes? Nah, don’t answer that.”
I know you don’t want an answer but loving high heels is Stockholm Syndrome of the feet. There’s a piccie here of what’s going on inside the foot whilst we’re admiring their fabulous design -
http://www.sciencephotogallery.co.uk/gallery/detail.php?code=P116/472
You have to wonder who’d actually want to buy a print of that though.
Rootlesscosmo: Yes but, many women do this as their art in all cultures. I think in the 60 abd 70s one of the things we learned was to honour what women do. Art is not only what is in a frame. Maybe it only becomes wrong when it becomes capitalism. All that decoration and effort described, the embroidery, the pleating, the trapunto and ruching, the clever way a garment is cut and the moose hair decoration, even the pearl diving, is many a woman’s pride. I was the (reluctant) beneficiary of the beautiful garments my mother made, hours and hours spent bent over her sewing machine, copying pages ripped from fashion magazines, patterns made from newspaper and brown paper, long into the middle of the night on her treadle machine. I know now this made her life bearable from the drudge job she held during the day to feed six of us. Everything was exquisite, perfect, admired, gasped over, oohed and ahhed over. You could not have stopped her.
Pony: I think McCarthy’s point–in an article about the social-class gradient in women’s magazines of the 50’s, from the perky earnestness of Charm and Glamour up to the languid snob-appeal of Vogue–was to stress how conspicuous consumption was a key to the appearance of luxury. (Her argument really has more to do with Veblen than with the Marxist labor theory of value, which derives value from “socially necessary” labor-time, while the prestige McCarthy’s talking about depends on the display of socially unnecessary, un-mechanized, inefficient production.) Home labor of the kind you describe–very movingly,I might add–seems to me to belong to a different (though not completely unrelated) realm, closer, as you say, to art than to commerce, though in one sense a defiance of commerce: “I wouldn’t wear that store-bought trash, I make my own clothing thank you very much.” It’s like the way I cook, from scratch–not “innocently” but as a conscious rejection of prepared, additive-heavy food products. The thing about the capitalist market is that even if you find ways to evade its reach, it’s still lurking out there, mumbling threats–like patriarchy, actually.
Sigh. Yes. RCmo. How I hate capitalism. I might add, I may have been the only child/young woman in the world whose report cards consistently said variations on “always beautifully dressed”.
Hed I bet you’ve got a pair like that. I had my generations equivalent; a spike heel, and no back or sides, nothing but a bit of twisted leather over the toe. Called “spring-o-later” or something like that.
I was still pondering the phenomenon of commentary rushing to justify choices in footwear and now, Twisty, you’ve justly summed it up. It’s beautiful because we are taught to believe that. It’s because the image of woman we are bombarded with is not heavy in the hips, wearing flat shoes and natural breasts. It’s the idea that somehow we have been convinced that a woman contorted and in pain is desirable and a product worth consuming, and we are loathe to let go of it. As a relative newcomer, I have found the time spent here to be challenging. I no longer put on certain shoes or items of clothing without the nagging awareness of what I’m really engaging in (I think, “If I ran into Twisty today, would I be ashamed?”). Am I a hypocrite? Sometimes. But my mind is bigger now, and my back hurts a lot less than it did before I was enlightened and kicked off the 3″, spiked shackles. Most days.
“The structure of patriarchy, which places anyone with a vagina in a continuum of femininity whether they like it or not”. Unless you’re a woman with a disability, in which case you’re non-feminine, non-sexual, non-female. Which at times is a very good thing (frees you up to do other things) and at other times not. It can be an interesting place to be - being a feminist, while fighting to be seen as a woman.
I wasn’t going to post this here, but on reflection I think it is important to the topic beginning with how we survive. Wikipedia of course, says she worked at her husband’s company. He was a journalist. She *named* the company after him. But she was the company, and she was the designer
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,60-2381376.html
http://www.passionsforfootwear.com/springo2/html/e5_1_s.htm
http://www.passionsforfootwear.com/springo2/html/eb_1_b4.htm
Well, everything is made in China now, so fine workmanship is kind of beside the point.
I’m just glad I don’t have bunions.
Are there any guidelines for
a) revealing where and when my biggest hypocracy offences may reveal themselves (without reference to footwear).
b) specific information to consider when aspiring to tackle the hitherto unrecognised misconceptions.
I’m lazy, checklist’s work fine for me, or rhyming mnemonics are quite fun too.
gennimcmahon, I am hugging you in my heart. Bless you, kiddo, you’re getting it. Thank you for thinking.
And who among us is without any hypocrisy? Twisty, no argument from me about heels — I’m totally in comfortably-shod agreement. But, I prefer to think of “inconsistent” rather than “a hypocrite.” I know you are trying to stretch our thinking, but …. I guess I’m just writing on behalf of the readers I imagine are upset at being called hypocrites. None of us is completely consistent about everything all the time, and that is perfectly okay. Reflection good, but apology not necessary.
JMO.
On the debate of craft verses industrial patriarchy planning; I have worked ‘behind the scenes’ in fashion design and consumerism planning. What people worship as the new thing in fashion is actually 3 to 5 years in the making of careful planning and research. It is absolutely dictated by the patriarchy from color to fabric to the workmanship. The cycle is such:
3-5 years, color prediction and planning, fashion demands and needs, psychologies of consumerism. The patriarchy really does his thing here.
At 3 years, color work is finalized and fabrics or parts are contracted to makers, weavers etc. This will take about a year to completion when the designers get ahold of it and make things. They were either in on the planning or use what is ‘there’ with maximum competition.
2 years - projects hit the runways. This is your vogue mags etc. What people call ‘New Season’ and current fashion, however;
1 year - These designs hit the mainstream stores about a year later in modified form and finally;
Your TJ maxes get the ‘new’ fashions.
This is clearly different from the Textile artist who is not in touch with the Knomes of Zurich of fashion and attempts to produce outside of the patriarchy norms. I agree that workmanship skill and art are extraordinarily valuable in our ‘usually produced under oppression’ table of plenty but we have to dig really deep to escape the shackles of “IMAN AssHo Legislating Your Existence”.
Preach it, Twisty!
atzbanite, put me down as one of those gosh-darn textile artists who is not in touch with the knomes of zurich. i make comfy stuff. and only wear same.
“Doing XYZ merely makes you a hypocrite.”
Yes!
Hypocrisy is the hardest thing for folks to acknowledge.
Dorky: The best part for me is the structure of the post since I’m near the end of writing my thesis. I hate the objective, stuffy nature of academic writing. This is a welcomed reprieve.
PS: Or as my own beloved spinster aunt puts it: “A good sermon should be like a good bra: uplifting, but not too pointed.”
Scratchy: “Also, there is the issue of navigating the delicate feminine tapestry of social control, which is so unbelievably painful — like pouring burning acid into one’s eyes — that my brain screams, my heart loses its will to pump and the world recedes from me. I will never make another attempt in my life to get along in a workplace which is regulated by delicate feminine mores. I can never see their workings until it becomes painfully obvious that I have violated some petty feature of their protocol and that I will be punished.”
I often felt the sting that comes when judged and admonished for my refusal to comply with esablished codes of ‘proper’ femininity. Said sting smarts when delivered from a fellow sufferer under patriarchy.
As if while in jail together, you find an escape hole and your cellmates rat you out in exchange for cigarettes from the warden. Accept, with the patriarchy, said activity is so deeply engrained that reward need not be given; satisfaction of putting a woman ‘in her place’ seems to serve as suffucient reward.
Hence also I believe, the hypert sensiivity to the shoe critiques as woman have learned to defend themselves from attack so often, that attack of footwear can easily be construed as attack of worthiness as a whole.
Or could that also point up the transgression in the patriarchy, of a women’s identity from being “I am what I do”, or possibly ‘ergo cugit sum” to “I am what I wear”?
Please excuse the typos, typing is a chore today as I sliced top of fingernail and some of finger today whilst working.
As a fairly regularlurker, who DOES for the most part enjoy this blog, I might add, I thought I would throw my “2 cents” in regarding the clarifications you feel the need to post on your views;
I don’t think that (most) women think that you “want to outlaw xyz”, however, I do think that women, especially those who are heterosexual such as myself wonder if we are, in your opinion, even contributing anything with our feminism *because* we are heterosexual. I agree that society is patriarchal and I agree that women, myself included, do things in order to “get by” in a society that demands we live up to our gender role. However, I also think that you have a wealth of knowledge to share with women, would-be feminists,young and old, and it gets skewed by the heavy sarcasm and ad hominem attacks, especially when you do not write about your own sex life,making yourself unable to be critiqued about it, yet you have no qualms about berating other womens (perceived) sexual proclivities. That is your choice, obviously, but it is a quality that some people I’m assuming find disingenous. Do I think that these women who feel the need to write copiously about how they love giving oral sex to men are in need of a reality check about *why* they feel the need to brag about this? sure. But I also think that as a lesbian (at least to my knowledge, as I believe you mentioned a female partner, if not, I stand corrected) who would obviously has no desire to partner with men, should realize that people who are not gay are going to feel differently about sexual activities (NOT just talking about the oral sex that you go on and on about). I’m not saying you have no right to give a feminist critique of het. sexuality, and I know a couple het. radical feminists who share the same beliefs, BUT as a het. woman *I* find the thought of lesbian sex disgusting FOR MYSELF (not speaking for anyone else at all) that doesn’t mean that no one else should participate in it, or that it is inherently wrong. Nor would i post with conviction how it is “humiliating”. If i did, I would expect to be, and rightly so, attacked for my heterosexism.
So, i guess after writing this novel, my question to you is, what is your opinion on heterosexual feminists (ones who choose to be in relationships)? Becuase relationships are give and take, and I doubt “my way or the highway” is going to go over too well with anyone, regardless of their gender. The tone of your blog seems to condemn women who partner with men, and disregard their relationships with women. As someone who grew up with sisters and has a great daughter, i find it hard to belive the fact that my marriage to (one) man must in some people’s eyes mean that my whole life revolves around “pleasing” him, nor do I find this to be a reality in any of my friend’s or coworkers lives.
Anyway,I hope that I’ll get an answer and I posted out of genuine curiously and willingness to understand other points of view.
Twisty–so refined! yes, indeed.
Pony–yes, it’s going to snow soon here, and we will all don our sturdy boots for the next 5-6 months, but once we get to the office, some will exchange them for less practical footwear either so as not to have sweaty feet or to comply with company dictates of femininity.
Atzbanite-do you read The Sartorialist’s blog? I like the photos because some of them are about how well people wear the look, and some are about how well people make the look their own.
Millie–I won’t speak for Twisty, but I imagine that even someone who is willing to post her post-op photos and pictures of bathrooms she has visited might want to reserve a zone of privacy about her life. The fact that a person has opinions about something does not mean she needs to divulge privae details about her life (or that you do) in order to express those opinions. For example, if it upsets you that Twisty t
hate those shoes. great post, twisty.
millie — there are all kinds of women here, in all kinds of domestic settings. i don’t think anyone needs to share details of their sex lives with the universe, in order to share observations about how women generally and individually face obstacles that men don’t.
(oops, finger slipped) says a certain sex act is disgusting, why do you then go ahead and do it yourself? I don’t get that.
Does Twisty (or anyone) have to be right about EVERYTHING to be right about some things?
I hear you Lene.
What is lesbian sex Millie? I don’t believe I know of anything lesbians do that I’ve not done with a man, or by myself.
Uh huh. I know footwear indoors changes, and you leave your winter boots at the door. But in the offices I’ve been no-one wears anything but stylish all leather Doc Martens or similar and shit-kickers.
Joanna Russ put it: “Feminism is not what you are. It’s what you do.”
“Jesus, what is it about shoes? Nah, don’t answer that.”
I wish I knew. And amen to everything else you said.
“i don’t think anyone needs to share details of their sex lives with the universe, in order to share observations about how women generally and individually face obstacles that men don’t.”
And I agree with this 100%. However, twisty doesn’t just make “observations” of obstacles women face, she makes broad, sweeping statements about women’s sex lives. She made snide comments along the lines of women getting angry at her for disapproving of ‘their favorite pastime of c*cksucking’ (or something to that nature). To ME, that is anti-woman, and she really has no reason to assume that if someone engages in oral sex that it must be their “pasttime”. Again, to me, that seems to be no different than calling a woman a “slut” if she is known to have had sex, even if it is just with one person.
“or example, if it upsets you that Twisty t (oops, finger slipped) says a certain sex act is disgusting, why do you then go ahead and do it yourself? I don’t get that. ”
It doesn’t “upset” me,I am simply pointing out that obviously if someone is not of the orientation they are critiquing, there are bound to be biases. Obviously a lesbian isn’t going to find heterosex appealing, and vice versa. Again, I have NO problem with anyone critiquing heterosexuality through the lens of feminism; I just feel that twisty’s tone is often demeaning to those who DO choose to partner with men.
A straight male friend who lives in SF was once telling some story about looking for such-and-such bar, and going into some other bar because he couldn’t find it, and feeling amazed by how many women there were in this other bar. Then, he said, he noticed that they were “all wearing comfortable shoes.”
This was supposed to clue me in that it was a lesbian bar. He felt if it was a mostly-straight bar, you could be certain there’d be some uncomfortable shoes about.
That detail of that story was the end of wearing even slightly uncomfortable shoes for me. You couldn’t get a much clearer statement that hetero female = pain, and I just can’t play into that any more.
Millie cocksucking is not an orientation.
Pony: not to be rude, but if you’re just going to make petty comments in response to my posts, please don’t waste your time, because it is not my intention to get into arguments on the internet. If you genuinely misunderstood, then let me clarify: I would assume a lesbian would not find heterosexual sex acts appealing, just as a heterosexual woman would not find lesbian sex acts appealing, thus, I do not think it is justified for people in either of these situations to pontificate how “gross” the other’s preferred sex acts are. Period. Agree or disagree all you want. I don’t feel that someone’s personal opinion about whether or not something is “icky” has anything to do with feminism.
Let me put this as plainly as I can: there are no sex acts that are exclusively lesbian and no sex acts that are exclusively heterosexual, as far as I know. And yes, you did come here to argue. Fire away. Don’t let the echo get to you.
I don’t know that I can agree that shoes or indeed anything about female appearance is “minor, minor really.” antelope’s story about how some people think a woman’s sexual orientation can be determined by shoe style would seem to indicate that may not be the case. More generally, women are, as Twisty calls it, “the sex class”–to misogynists, we are nothing BUT appearance. Presenting an appearance not in keeping with heteronormative, patriarchal definitions of what is attractive is not just a woman expressing her identity, but is a woman asserting she even HAS an identity. Even minor variations can have a huge impact and repercussions, which is why it’s often such a battle of self-examination and discomfort for many women when we make a change to our appearance.
And even in this, patriarchy wins: we’re spending our time thinking about how our shoes oppress us (and other women) when we could be raising a stink about the inveterate underrepresentation of women in the Nobel prizes.
Jess–I’m okay with “hypocrite.” It DOES upset me to be called one, and I think that’s the point. Well, that and the fact that it’s true.
“Obviously a lesbian isn’t going to find heterosex appealing”
That depends on what you mean by “lesbian.” :-)
If you mean “lesbian” as in, “Woman who sleeps exclusively with women because she finds the thought of p/v intercourse repellent”, then yeah, I’d say you’re right.
However, if you mean, “Women who could easily sleep with men BUT CHOOSE NOT TO because they’d rather devote their time and energy to other women”, or, “Women who desire and sleep with men but call themselves lesbians as a political statement”, then I’d say desire has very little to do with it.
The first relies on the old idea that sexuality is “natural”, and is most likely to be used by non-political lesbians and lesbians who identify as “gay women”; women who believe they were born gay.
The second (where Twisty’s comin’ from) is based on the idea that desire and revulsion are social constructs designed to make heterosexuality seem natural; so the “need” to sleep with a man is actually the result of living in a culture that grooms us for straightness, rather than an inherent, biologically-based drive. This position is taken up lesbian separatists and radical lesbian feminists, although some straight and bi women take it up as a show of solidarity (postmodernists and ‘genderfuckers’ support the ‘sexuality is constructed’ view as well, although they reach very different conclusions.)
Feminist author Joanna Russ was a self-proclaimed Lesbian, yet she slept with men. This didn’t mean her lesbianism was meaningless; just that it was about prioritising women over men, instead of some inborn orientation.
Heh..I apologise for rambling on. But I do enjoy it on occasion.
This week on Oprah:
“My guests, Twisty Faster and Eddie Izard will debate lipstick and high heels!”
Becker Said: Joanna Russ put it: “Feminism is not what you are. It’s what you do.â€
I completely agree. I’m teaching my Women and Health students about “ideal femininity” and how beauty is conflated with healthiness. When I do, I always find myself interrogating my own practices. I dye my hair, wear makeup, worry about my weight and do plenty of other things which are defined by patriarchy as “womanly”. I also recognize that my practices give me things. I have more respect from colleagues and students, people tell me I look nice (or don’t tell me I look “so tired”). And, I don’t have to work at being an iconoclast which if you’re in the dominant culture does take time and energy (for me at least).
So I tell myself that I know how I’m doing the work of the patriarchy and how I resist it. The problem is that I find the divide between what I think and what I do is tilting too much in the wrong direction. Maybe I need to go read some of the work of early 2nd wave femininsts–they didn’t mess around when they looked at women’s worlds.
Which is why I like reading your blog Twisty. You keep pushing me in my own thinking.
Hooray for Millie. I fucking HATE the idea that to give a blowjob is an un- or anti-feminist act. Yes, blowjobs would necessarily, inherently not exist if it weren’t for the patriarchy: patriarchy = men, men = penises, licking and sucking on a penis = blowjob. But it’s understood all over the dang world that having your parts, whatever your parts are, licked and sucked feels great. So giving your male partner a blowjob has absolutely nothing to do with feminism or the patriarchy. Quit dragging blowjobs into the discussion, please.
I also have a real hard time with people who identify as lesbians solely for political reasons, rather than for personal reasons of attraction and love and sexuality. I understand the impulse–it’s like white people identifying as black to show their solidarity with the oppressed. I get it. But equality is about diversity, honesty, truth, and everything else. Declaring ourselves as we are, and being accepted as we are. Not identifying ourselves as something we’re not. Why does sexuality have to be political at all? Yeah, yeah, I know, it necessarily is in our current homophobic misogynistic patriarchal society. I get that. But in my Utopian world, sexuality isn’t political; it just is. No one has to identify as anything other than what they are. And they’re all allowed to lick their partners’ genitals, or not, as they please.
Pedantic off-thread comment:
Wendy (and Millie and others?): Checklist: Adrienne Rich’s essay, “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence” in book of collected essays called “Blood, Bread and Poetry,” I think, or something like.
Also on the checklist: “On Lies, Secrets and Silence,” the whole collection, although specifically the essay on lies and honor among women.
And since Joanna Russ’s name keeps appearing, her book “How to Suppress Women’s Writing.” Also, did I miss something? Why do people keep talking about her in the past tense?
Shoutouts to Pony and kelleybell!
yrs, B. Dagger Lee
Dear Twisty,
one of the reasons I love you most is that you keep us on our toes, but not in that awkward and blister-inducing high-heeled way.
Slashy
I was just about to write a blog post asking whether getting married made me a bad feminist. But as always, Twisty is ten steps ahead of me. Wow.
Jess: “And who among us is without any hypocrisy? Twisty, no argument from me about heels — I’m totally in comfortably-shod agreement. But, I prefer to think of “inconsistent†rather than “a hypocrite.†I know you are trying to stretch our thinking, but …. I guess I’m just writing on behalf of the readers I imagine are upset at being called hypocrites.”
Well, Jess, the readers are always upset at me about something. But it’s less insulting to call it hypocrisy, since “inconsistency” implies a sort of feckless, disordered mind, whereas we hypocrites at least know what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, which, unless we’re just sociopaths, in many cases leads to us doing less of it. Well, that’s the goal, anyway.
Millie: “the tone of your blog seems to condemn women who partner with men and disregard their relationships with women.”
I recognize that it is difficult for some readers not to take it personally when I critique social conventions to which they may themselves adhere, but I had hoped that by now it would be understood, and require no daily explanation, that I do not condemn women for anything. I refer you to the title of the blog for clarification of this point.
It is understandable, too, that “a straight woman [who finds] the thought of lesbian sex disgusting” might misinterpret my suggestion that straight women re-examine their motivation for performing certain behaviors. I’m not saying that women should dump men because blow jobs are disgusting or that straight relationships are lame because I’m a big ol’ dyke and I think everyone should be like me. I’m saying that women of all orientations will benefit from pursuit of liberation from patriarchal oppression, but that in so doing, they must be willing to face the idea that male domination, often imperceptibly, creates their tastes and manipulates their behavior. I’ve noticed over the years that this last idea is particularly rough going for straight women in committed relationships with men, but lots of lesbians run aground here, too, since many lesbo relationships are based on the heteronomative model. Mostly because there isn’t any other model.
In a post-patriarchal society — that is, a society in which no sex class exists to service the default human class — a blow job, if it were to occur at all, would be of no feminist consequence, because it would involve two beings of commensurate social status.
For the record, I have feckless disordered mind. Just sayin.
Me too.
I’m bi: feckless disorderd AND hypocritical.
Hey BDagger Lee!
And Al, thank you, you take me to places I’ve never been. I read you and a couple others of your generation and I’m just knocked back. What hope for the future.
“No one has to identify as anything other than what they are”
And no one has to accept that what they are is a given either. But everyone should examine what they happen to be and change if it’s not working.
I will admit to being inconsistent about things which I have not yet studied, I am sometimes hypocritical in subjects which I have studied. I too will admit to a feckless and disordered mind, especially before coffee.
I gave up high heels after the first round of shin splints. I admire them as an artform in a sculptural way but I have no love affair with pain.
Joanna Russ is not dead, thank the Lord.
SaltyC I think you should head north. I pick Nelson BC for you.
http://www.nelsonbc.ca/
Joanna Russ isn’t dead, but I believe she’s not well, and not writing much lately.
First of all, thanks, Twisty, for your response.
“It is understandable, too, that “a straight woman [who finds] the thought of lesbian sex disgusting†might misinterpret my suggestion that straight women re-examine their motivation for performing certain behaviors.”
I used your writings on oral sex as an example of the overall tone of this blog–not as a specific. Not everyone who disagrees with you, not everyone who is heterosexual comes to this blog as some kind of “blowjob proponent” which seems to be what your above paragraph insinuates. So, again, to quote myself, “what is your opinion on heterosexual feminists (ones who choose to be in relationships)? ” and you say, “I’m saying that women of all orientations will benefit from pursuit of liberation from patriarchal oppression”. Great. I would like to hear more about this.
And while, maybe you do not “condemn” women, perhaps poor choice of words, you do engage in attempting to shout them down if they disagree with you, you make posts mocking them.if you had a true interest in educating more women about feminism, I don’t think you would engage in these tactics. If a woman does not agree that it would be “ideal” to be only in a same-sex romantic relationship or none at all, she is characterized as being a defensive straight person who just doesn’t “get it”. And yeah, maybe I don’t “get it”. But maybe you don’t “get it”, either. Before having my child, and being faced with the responsibility of raising a girl who will one day grow up to be a woman in this society, I really had no interest in feminism..i find myself opening my eyes to the things that do happen to women becuase they are women, and I want to prepare/protect my daughter from that to the best of my ability.
I know this isn’t the forum for this - apologies to Twisty - but Liz, it’s good to see you. I was just thinking of you this morning as I lifted weights at the gym. I hope you are well; your words are much missed.
Twisty - per usual, thank you for your outright honesty, clarity, and gorgeous use of language.
Twisty — the shoe motif and related discussion, and your last post, seem much more balanced than the earlier discussion about blowjobs. I agree that most heels are ridiculously painful and only wear them on very limited occasions. I think there’s another way to look at making this choice besides hypocrisy, though. One test can be — is the amount of compromise in the name of fashion that I am making more than what men make, and therefore reflective of patriarchy, or is it fairly equivalent to the steps men take, such as face-shaving, back-waxing, tie-wearing, etc. Of course, any acceptance of pain is ridiculous, but wearing fashionable platforms that aren’t as comfortable as sneakers, but pretty comfortable, and a dress that’s not as comfortable as sweats, but also comfortable, to certain occasions, doesn’t have to be hypocrisy. Sure, maybe it’s vanity. But denying any step that makes one feel good about oneself isn’t like saying “I won’t bend further than a man would have to” and isn’t contrary to feminist beliefs.
Similarly, with blowjobs. You’re absolutely right that “women [should] re-examine their motivation for performing certain behaviors.” It could be true that “male domination, often imperceptibly, creates their tastes and manipulates their behavior.” However, not all blowjobs are created equal. In a relationship that’s even-handed — and some of us are quite able to judge this even within the constraints of the patriarchy — mutual pleasuring does not have to reflect some kind of subservience.
I also have to agree with Millie and Katerhiner and disagree with Al. It seems ridiculous to identify as a lesbian solely for political reasons. You’re attracted to whom you’re attracted to, period. If feminism required women to call themselves something other than what they were, now that would be hypocrisy.
teffie Ph. D. I don’t “diss” what you do to stay in the running. However, I refuse to do those things and don’t think it makes as much of a difference as you may think it does. I know that many who dye their hair, watch their weight, wear makeup, etc. believe that their standing in society depends on monitoring their appearance in this way.
The message it sends, I think, is that you are in compliance to the demands of the patriarchy.
I don’t think all this helps with careers. Men may not want sex with you as you get older unless you take hormones and stuff, however. So you have to decide if it’s worth it to you.
I’ve always thought that re-examining my thoughts, attitudes and reasons is a healthy, if sometimes ouchy, process. A quick peep at the FAQ will tell you that IBTP is *not* a feminist primer. But then again I’m just as feckless and disordered as the next blamer.
Twisty is never ever going to be forgiven for being rude about the almighty blowjob.
Twisty, I’m glad you made that original post. To me it seemed that what you were doing was providing a space, a tiny space, for women who weren’t so keen on the idea or who weren’t sure, to reflect on it without the enormous pressure from the blowjob-promoting patriarchy bearing down on them.
Millie, I think part of Twisty’s point is that Patriarchy damages our ability to make choices by perverting everything into gestures of either domination or submission. It isn’t the fault of women that everything we do is subject to such perversion, and women often have to do the best they can, simply to survive in a culture that views them as being subjects of male domination. That’s why (I believe) she says she doesn’t blame women for getting married, etc. When women have to do certain things just to survive in the Patriarchy (i.e. getting married is the only real way to accrue a large number of legal benefits and presumably increases one’s ability to secure resources for children), then it’s not necessarily a true exercising of a woman’s free will. And for this, we blame the patriarchy.
I really hope that this isn’t totally incoherent!
But if everybody starts wearing comfortable, black suede Vans, I won’t be a unique individual anymore!
It seems the Cosmo Girl rule has been invoked. Can white women take someone being not nice about thier fashion choices? The answer is no! But women all over the world continue to put their lives on the line to fight for women’s freedom without worrying if Twisty approves of their footwear. Maybe you could all ask how they do it.
“It seems ridiculous to identify as a lesbian solely for political reasons. You’re attracted to whom you’re attracted to, period. If feminism required women to call themselves something other than what they were, now that would be hypocrisy. ”
Agreed. And I don’t have a problem, per se, even if someone did just soley “choose” to be a lesbian. However,I just haven’t heard of many real life accounts of that. Most gay people(to my knowledge) recall having those feels from the time they are children, before they had any knowledge of the social mores regarding sexual orientation. So if there is not at *least* a partial biological determinism aspect to sexuality, what would explain that?
Following that train of thought, if sexuality is fully/partially inborn, how is it proactive to tell a woman (or man) that they could choose to undue their societal conditioning and become attracted to the same-sex or both sexes (bisexual, I presume). Because, quite frankly, I don’t buy it. I mean, yeah, i could “choose” to be physically sexual with women, but it would mean nothing to me– I would not fall in love with women, the way I do men. I would not be attracted to a woman’s body, the way I am to a man’s. There would not be the spark of..whatever you want to call it, magic, chemistry, hormones, to make me have the desire and attraction to them that is necessary for any type of relationship. I *do* feel like heterosexual women are unfairly pegged as being man-centric to the point of thinking the only time we want to be around women is to discuss shoes or stake out a new man or talk trash about other women. Maybe I’ve just been blessed with a great group of friends,but I’ve never seen this. I’ve maintained several of my friendships over decades, we have been there for each other through a lot of hard times..yet, our relationships are non-sexual. I guess I”m just not seeing as how female/female sexual relationships seem to be presented at the top of the feminist hierarchy.
Why don’t you tell us Shannon? Starting with yourself.
“If a woman does not agree that it would be “ideal†to be only in a same-sex romantic relationship or none at all, she is characterized as being a defensive straight person who just doesn’t “get it”"
This seems such a bizarre interpretation as to be a wilful misreading. This isn’t a lesbian bootcamp, and if you think it is why do you keep coming back when you feel the way you say you do?
For me, being a feminist is not just about discussing the overt nasties of the patriarchy that, if we’re real lucky, we can locate outside of our own lives (such as domestic violence, rape, pay gaps etc). It’s also about examining our most private experiences and relationships. And it’s not a zero-sum game. If I decide, for an overdone example, that I think blowjobs are patriarchy driven, it doesn’t mean I can never do that for my partner and it doesn’t mean that I must become a lesbian (cos God knows if there’s no blowjobs, it must be lesbian sex all round. wtf??). It seems like you’re attacking an argument that isn’t being presented on this blog.
“I understand the impulse–it’s like white people identifying as black to show their solidarity with the oppressed.”
The point of a straight woman identifying as a lesbian is not to show solidarity with the oppressed. While that may be a secondary effect, the true point is to demonstrate that the definition of sexuality (”gay”, “straight”, etc) is itself a cultural construct.
Twisty, forget about shoes. What is up with women’s clothing as a whole? My pockets are too small to fit a decent sized wallet, so I am forced to either carry only my my debit card and keys (which I often do) or lug around a big awkard purse. It’s as if the patriarchy is literally trying to hold me down.
Millie,
I’m fairly confident that what you say makes sense to you. Some of us have not the pleasure of understanding you. You have some galloping assumptions and a goodly bit of straw, none of which makes for a reasoned argument. You brought the lesbian sex is disgusting thing, and then the nothing outside my experience is possible since I haven’t seen it thingamy. Then the request for explaination and discussion. Feminist hierarchy? You’ve got to be kidding, but you’re not.
BJs and shoes, BJs and shoes, I’m bored. What’s for dinner?
It is “ridiculous to identify as a lesbian for political reasons”?
Sure, if political gestures in general are ridiculous. But you don’t really believe that, do you? Certainly you have observed that people modify their behavior for political reasons all the time. Some people don’t eat meat, some people don’t pay taxes, some people move to Canada, some people stop watching “Seinfeld,” some people don’t laugh at racist jokes, some people chain themselves to the courthouse steps, some people blow themselves up, some people don’t fuck men.
well, around here we have leftover turkey and leftover wild rice — no more dressing, no more yams, but there is some gravy left. and some soup. one piece of pumpkin pie, but plenty of spray-on whipped cream. we are fresh out of mini corn dogs, which my daughter ate last night in lieu of turkey.
When did that happen Delphyne, the *without the patriarchy* part? Looks to me like this pack of poseurs we have here on this and the other thread qualify soundly as patriarchy, if not male.
Well, Pony, first they get some grounding in the real problems in their communities. They go out of their tiny little white girl world and actually talk to other people in the community- hopefully listening and eventually figuring out that most folks haven’t even heard of Twisty, and that their feminism problems are more about how their baby died because of bad prenatal care and pollution, or about how their husband expects them to go and have the house spotless after they get back from their jobs, or the fact that they are having problems with childcare, or that their daughter is dealing with pressure to perform sex acts she’s not ready for, than whether random people approve of their heels(which give them corns and make their feet hurt).
Now, smaller things can help the patriarchy, it’s like a brick in the wall. But kicking ass to fight the patriarchy tends to be a winning strategy. The women in Oaxaca Mexico don’t wait til they are perfect to fight for their rights. Heck, everywhere in the world, you see women protesting against sexual assaults, a lack of tampons, and the like. We’re not alone in our movement. But the movement is not for us to feel good about ourselves. The movement is for women’s freedom.
So let’s kick ass. And ask the Hendoistic Pleasureseeker how to cook meat without causing biohazards
yeah, i know. mini corn dogs. what was i thinking? go ahead and give me an F.
i was thinking my daughter should eat something while she is filling out those college apps, and she ain’t eating what i cooked several days ago. she’s turning out ok, though. she buys the stupid shoes with her own money, but doesn’t wear them much — has lost a lot of her longtime friends because she doesn’t get into the high-school cliquey garbage, and isn’t into pleasing boys. i admire her. never thought it would still be this bad for girls all these years later.
Thebewilderness, Millie’s point seems to me to read pretty clearly: contrary to what ms_mutt and Al are claiming, sexuality is not a purely cultural construct, but at least partially biologically based.
I think while sexuality is certainly a spectrum and cultural norms may affect exact positioning on that spectrum, they can’t push one from one end to the other. Ms_mutt’s claim that “the point of a straight woman identifying as a lesbian …is to demonstrate that the definition of sexuality (â€gayâ€, “straightâ€, etc) is itself a cultural construct†makes no sense. I could identify as a cat; it wouldn’t demonstrate that species is a cultural construct. Friends of mine who came out in their early teens or younger find it ludicrous that a straight woman could feel that identifying as a lesbian makes some kind of political statement. For any movement, being truthful to oneself is the only correct statement.
Shannon, no offense, honestly, but why do you assume that women can only think about/talk about/be concerned about one thing at a time, or one level of severity of a thing at a time? It’s possible to think about and discuss blow jobs and spiked heels at the same time, or at least on the same day, as it is possible to think about and discuss and be concerned about the situation in Oaxaca, the situation in Afghanistan and Iraq, women’s situaiton everywhere. It’s also possible to think about and analyze blow jobs and spiked heels even if you have really, really suffered as a woman. I have really, really suffered as a woman. I also really, really suffer for women, all of the time. I sit in front of my computer many, many days weeping (which is not to be manipulative, which is to tell you the effing truth of how blasted seriously I take women’s issues.) I’m betting most women here have been through really hard things and similarly feel deeply for women. Yet we find it possible anyhow to discuss spike heels and blow jobs. The truth is, there are connections between all of the hardships women experience. Blowjobs and spike heels figure in, too, there are connections there. It doesn’t make sense to call women out for talking about whatever they want to talk about, to trivialize it in the way you seem to want to.
I mean, yeah, i could “choose†to be physically sexual with women, but it would mean nothing to me– I would not fall in love with women, the way I do men. I would not be attracted to a woman’s body, the way I am to a man’s. There would not be the spark of..whatever you want to call it, magic, chemistry, hormones, to make me have the desire and attraction to them that is necessary for any type of relationship.
How do you know?
Heart
sexuality is not a purely cultural construct, but at least partially biologically based.
Why do you think so?
Heart
For any movement, being truthful to oneself is the only correct statement.
And my friends would say women change over the course of their lives, that the way we are treated in the world changes us, and for that reason what is true about us — what there is for us to be truthful *to* — also changes. Especially if we are feminists.
Heart
Twisty, your examples are misleading. Sure, it’s not ridiculous to make a political gesture if it’s not a repudiation of something fundamental to you. Red meat, taxes, a particular location or TV show – these are not fundamental to most of us, and therefore may make sense to give up for the right reason. For most heterosexual women with a normal sex drive, however, fucking men is quite fundamental.
Moreover, it’s hard to understand how not fucking men, even if not a ridiculous thing to do (which I maintain that it is), is effective as a political statement. The only statement it makes is that the woman in question (1) hasn’t been able to find an egalitarian sexual relationship, or (2) has been able to do so, but somehow feels that renouncing this makes some sort of statement about others’ inability to do so. Neither of these statements are as effective as the more challenging one of working on your own behalf and for others to structure egalitarian relationships between men and women.
“Millie,
I’m fairly confident that what you say makes sense to you. Some of us have not the pleasure of understanding you. You have some galloping assumptions and a goodly bit of straw, none of which makes for a reasoned argument. You brought the lesbian sex is disgusting thing, and then the nothing outside my experience is possible since I haven’t seen it thingamy. Then the request for explaination and discussion. Feminist hierarchy? You’ve got to be kidding, but you’re not. ”
I’m not “assuming” anything. I never said EVERY gay person believed they were born that way, I said MANY (or most, I forget the wording) state that they were attracted to the same sex long before they knew about any political or social implications of being gay. If you have evidence of this being false, I’m all ears. Until then, I’ll stand by what I said, which I believe was plain as day to understand. And yeah, I’ll stand by what I said about feminist hierarchy as well. Clearly the voices of feminists partnered with men ,or who even share a different perspective are not valued, if that were not the case, then I would be receiving *real* replies to the posts that I took time to write instead of dismissals.
That’s it. I call for all Joanna Russ blogging, all the time.
And not to change the subject and all, but what are our thoughts on flip-flops, or “thongs”? (As in, “The only thongs I wear are on my feet.”) Also known, I believe, as “shower shoes” but aren’t limited to the mere shower.
Edith: people in Los Angeles used to call those “go-aheads” because if you try to back up you wind up barefoot.
“Sure, if political gestures in general are ridiculous. But you don’t really believe that, do you? Certainly you have observed that people modify their behavior for political reasons all the time. Some people don’t eat meat, some people don’t pay taxes, some people move to Canada, some people stop watching “Seinfeld,†some people don’t laugh at racist jokes, some people chain themselves to the courthouse steps, some people blow themselves up, some people don’t fuck men. ”
I think it would be more of a political gesture to state that one does choose to have sex/relationships with men due to XYZ rather than calling oneself a lesbian, which most people are going to assume, means that you have an innate attraction to women which has little or nothing to do with dislike of men. To relay it to your example…if someone is a vegetarian for ethical reasons, they’re most likely going to state that, rather than just say “oh i just don’t like the taste of ham”. I don’t see how it helps women to have a relationship with someone, assuming sex is involved in a relationship with a “political lesbian”, whom has no true attraction to them.
this whole thread is making my mind boggle. In a good way.
“In a relationship that’s even-handed — and some of us are quite able to judge this even within the constraints of the patriarchy — mutual pleasuring does not have to reflect some kind of subservience. (octogalore)”
Octogalore, thank you for finding words for that for me. I couldn’t come up with the right combination of phrases that didn’t involve words not normally used in polite company.
“that the definition of sexuality (â€gayâ€, “straightâ€, etc) is itself a cultural construct. ”
Then explain why there are gay people who continue to be gay despite rejection from the their religious communities, families, and society,after ‘deprograming’ attempts, after marriages,etc. Explain how gay men and women have told how they had a same-sex crush when they were small children and never felt the same about the opposite sex growing up or in adulthood. If “straight” is a cultural construct, so is “gay”. So that would mean there would be some kind of motivating factor for gays and lesbians to only be attracted to their same sex–and I’m not seeing what that would be since we live in a homophobic society.
“contrary to what ms_mutt and Al are claiming, sexuality is not a purely cultural construct, but at least partially biologically based.”
Ok, I am not saying that sexuality itself is a purely cultural construct. Obviously, it is body based.
However, the way sexuality is *defined* and the expectations/baggage that come with those defintions (aka the patriarchy) are cultural constructs. These definitions don’t necessarily change someone’s innate sexuality, but they can influence how someone chooses to express her sexuality.
I’m technically a teenager (two weeks to go), so high school is a fresh memory for me. The pressure to label my sexuality and take on the accompanying baggage was intense. Among other things, I’ve been gropped in the school hallway and had condoms thrown at me. Why? Because I refused to date anyone (okay, my mom wouldn’t let me, but still). Since, I was not a “good” heterosexual (who was sexually owned by some boy) or a “good” lesbian (who performed sex acts on hawt girls for boys’ entertainment, not to be confused with a real lesbian), people would go out of their way to harrass me. This had a huge impact on how I sexually express myself.
It’s an extreme example, but you can be sure the way sexuality was defined and the baggage which accompanied it in this scenario were cultural constructs.
I mean, yeah, i could “choose†to be physically sexual with women, but it would mean nothing to me– I would not fall in love with women, the way I do men. I would not be attracted to a woman’s body, the way I am to a man’s. There would not be the spark of..whatever you want to call it, magic, chemistry, hormones, to make me have the desire and attraction to them that is necessary for any type of relationship.
How do you know?
Heart ”
There is no sexual attraction and there is no mental attraction to lead to a romantic bond with women. I don’t think attraction is something that is ever fully expressable with words. There’s no clear answer as to why I fell in love with the man i married as opposed to someone else, It just happened. I think people can “this person had xyz qualities i was looking for” or whatever, but at the end of the day,either there is attraction or there isn’t. Please see my other posts regarding this, maybe that will further clarify.
For most heterosexual women with a normal sex drive, however, fucking men is quite fundamental.
I don’t think so. I think for most heterosexual men with a normal sex drive fucking women is quite fundamental, which isn’t the same thing at all. I think lots of women who understand themselves to be het don’t like sex with men all that much, much less find it fundamental, but they give it their best shot anyway because they can’t imagine themselves other than as het women in relationships with men. (And who benefits most from that particular set-up?)
Moreover, it’s hard to understand how not fucking men, even if not a ridiculous thing to do (which I maintain that it is), is effective as a political statement.
What do you think happens when women tell their male partners, or all men everywhere, that they aren’t fucking them anymore? What might happen if all women told all men they weren’t fucking men anymore?
I can’t think of a much more effective political statement.
Heart
I think people can “this person had xyz qualities i was looking for†or whatever, but at the end of the day,either there is attraction or there isn’t.
I think you’re wrong about this. I think our politics can and do change our attractions. I think lots of women have learned this over decades now.
Octagalore, how would the man or men i