Karen Rayne, who runs her own marvelous blog about teen sexuality, is one of the editors of the new Blog Nosh. Blog Nosh kindly reposts today my piece on Sex, Rape, Consent and Enthusiasm. This is one of those “basic idea” pieces that I am eager to see reach a wide audience. I am pleased and grateful it has been picked up.
Archive for the 'Links' Category
I am delighted with all the hits I got as a result of Andrew Sullivan linking today to my post about the causal effect that legalizing gay marriage clearly has on sports championships. Jeff Fecke gets the credit.
I haven’t had over 5000 unique visitors in a single day in a very long time — and the last time was in the midst of the whole Full Frontal Feminism argument that tore up the feminist blogosphere!
Sullivan also notes something I forgot, which was that Denmark legalized same-sex unions (without using the term marriage) way back in 1989 — and promptly won the next European championship in 1992.
The evidence grows stronger.
My flight home from Florida just got changed from Sunday night to Monday morning. (So much for having “status” on American Airlines.) I know that some of my students read my blog, so if you’re enrolled in my Monday day classes, those classes are, I regret, cancelled. My Monday night class will meet as scheduled; I’m due into LAX now at 1:40PM and that ought to give me more than enough time to reach Pasadena by 6:00PM. I can’t promise a shower in between.
I’ll try to get back into regular blogging next week. For now, a smattering of links:
Chris Clarke’s new book, Walking with Zeke, is available. For fans of animals, good writing, or both, this is a must-have.
There’s a great discussion at Feministe about the perils and rewards of blogging about your personal life.
Daisy at Our Descent on the problem of “being a good man.”
Richard Mouw makes his usual good-sense on “seeker-sensitive” churches.
Brownfemipower on renouncing the feminist label.
Anxious Black Woman on keeping the feminist label.
A rape survivor looks for fellow survivors to help with a survey.
Lauren admits she loved Zamfir and his pipes when she was a child, and asks for readers’ embarrassing revelations about the poor aesthetic choices they made when they were small.
In a piece that may have more than a little bearing on the “attribution/appropriation” wars in the blogosphere lately, songwriter Darrell Brown tells of being an “emotional spy”:
We (songwriters) record everything we witness in some way or another, taking notes on scraps of paper or recording snippets of melody or other inspiration into our voice mail so when we are alone we can retrieve and use them later. Another friend, Mary McCann, a poet who lives in Seattle, summed this process up pretty well: “Keep livng and take really good notes.”
Yeah, that’s true for bloggin’ as well.
A reader named Gwynn writes:
I’ve been thinking about you recently as my boyfriend and I have been talking about feminism.
He’s 25, I’m 34, but this is not about our age difference per se. A bit before we started dating, I told him I was a feminist, and he took the kind of not-uncommon position something like “well as long as you’re not mad at me personally…” But when we spoke further, I found him very receptive to feminist ideas. He was simply clueless, which isn’t uncommon in either sex, I suppose.
I gave him a bunch of links to read (from this blog and elsewhere).
So everything was great and I’ve been calling him a feminist. But lately he’s admitted he’s not comfortable calling himself a feminist because of his lack of actual education about it, and because he’s afraid someone like his sister or mom will argue with him if he uses that title. And also, feminist stuff is starting to seriously stress him out and sometimes when it comes up, it makes him really miserable, partly from a generic perspective (”the world is really fucked up!”) and partly selfishly.
The way I can approach sympathy for his position is as a white person. Racism is an issue where I’m in the oppressive majority, so I can understand the discomfort that comes with that position. Otherwise I’d probably get truly irritated when he says things like “I just don’t like having so much anger directed at me that I don’t deserve,” etc. I talk him through this stuff as best I’m able.
He’s also freaked out around ideas like “what can I personally do about misogyny?” and “seriously, I can never use the word ‘bitch’ again?” and “do men really have a vested interest in keeping women down?” and “but how does patriarchy benefit me personally?”
I’m not a gatekeeper of feminism. I’m a student of it, like most people. I don’t want to be his feminist authority.
I’m pretty good at answering the questions and challenging him. We had, for instance, a whole discussion in which I convinced him that the position that all heterosexual sex is rape is, while (IMO) wrong, not actually ridiculous. He’s open to everything that I say. He agrees that gender stuff is fucked up. (Of course, he’s especially receptive to arguments about how patriarchy hurts men, but I’m fine with that. I hate how patriarchy hurts men too, and as long as you’re not using that as a way of saying “so shut up, bitches, at least you don’t have to do dangerous jobs”, I’m totally cool with discussing it.)
I wish he had a male feminist mentor of some kind, but I don’t see that happening. I wish he was more well read about it, but he’s been reading “The Republic” for about the past year, which indicates how much time he spends with books and how slow he is at it.
I guess my sort of general question is, without doing all of his work for him, or letting him off the hook, how does a girlfriend help a boyfriend with feminism?
One of the problems in any age-disparate relationship — particularly when the older partner is committed to a spiritual or political ideal about which the younger knows little — is that a kind of complicated mentoring relationship can develop. The younger partner, so often infatuated with the older, can easily associate their new love’s beliefs with the new love himself or herself. In other words, the interest in feminism could (and in Gwynn’s boyfriend’s case, I don’t know for sure) become inextricably linked with Gwynn, and his receptivity to feminism thus rises and falls with the status of the relationhip. That’s always problematic.
But there are two basic issues here: how to get young men to understand — and embrace — feminism, and how can a romantic partner help in that process, if at all? Continue reading ‘Girlfriends, boyfriends, feminism: a long response to “Gwynn”’
Of all the responses to yesterday’s Barack Obama speech, Russell Arben Fox has written my favorite: The Speech. It’s a lengthy post, but worth the push. BlackAmazon has a briefer, but in its own right quite powerful take.
Lynn writes on being “white and ethnic”.
Our Descent proffers the Proust Questionnaire.
Sylvia on Shirley Chisholm, the first candidate for president for whom I wore a button (age five).
Jessica at Jezebel posts in response to Elizabeth Wurtzel’s piece in the Times, and my “blowback”. She gets my name wrong, but that’s okay. My great-great-great grandfather was named Hugh Goodfellow, so you can call me Hugh all you like.
My brother has a blog, of a sort: A Cuppe of News. It’s a bulletin board for information about upcoming talks in early modern studies throughout Southwest England. My little brother is senior lecturer at Exeter, father of three, and one of the men in the world whom I admire most.
And an archive of my little sister’s writing at the Santa Barbara Independent is here. She is 29 today, which is a splendid age to be.
J.K. Gayle has a fine post up summarizing the history of women who have run for office. I knew all but one of the names; I learned today for the first time of Frances Farenthold. Good stuff. Also, see Reclusive Leftist for an excellent take on the “unconscious bias” that favors Obama over Clinton.
At Feministe, and at Elaine’s place, discussion has broken out over the question of how a married woman can best introduce her well-meaning but at times infuriatingly sexist husband to the basic insights of feminism. (The conversation is broad enough that it need not be limited to those who are married, and indeed, another thread has started about how to raise very young feminist daughters.) Despite some attempts at hijacking by the usual trolls, the discussion has been excellent; do check out Elaine’s post and the Feministe threads.
The last time I got involved in a discussion like this in the blogosphere, I said something idiotically pompous (perhaps at Punkass Blog, perhaps at Violet Socks) about being a “professional” who “did feminism for a living.” It was one of my many low points on the internets, and I do repent of it. The fact that I am paid to teach gender studies courses means that I am privileged enough to earn money for doing justice work, but it hardly makes me either wiser or more personally invested in the cause than other activists. But what all of these years and years of teaching feminism to often suspicious audiences has taught me is that there are indeed a few effective ways to “reach” the well-intentioned but misguided. Continue reading ‘On “engendering” change’
I’m late to the party, but count me as a big fan of “Stuff White People Like.” Check it out for yourself; the entries on dogs, divorce, veganism, and marathons are spot on.
In a not-entirely dissimilar vein, here’s my old Happy WASP boy post.
I’ve spent part of my time this week scribbling out some thoughts about Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity, the genuinely extraordinary new book from Robert Jensen, professor of journalism at the University of Texas.
Deo volente and the crick don’t rise, I’ll finish my review tomorrow and post it. In the meantime, Courtney Martin has her own thoughts up at Feministing, and the comment thread below her piece is very interesting. Courtney is clearly troubled by the book, both by its insights into a world she has deliberately avoided, and by Jensen’s radical proposed solution: the eradication of masculinity as a category of human identity. I’m less troubled — largely because I think Jensen is more right than Courtney would like to believe.
I’ll say this as a preview: this is the first non-fiction book I’ve read this year that’s made me weep. It’s the best thing I’ve read about pornography in years, and it functions brilliantly on many levels. It’s so good that as I read, at times fighting back tears, I cursed Robert Jensen for writing the book I would have longed to write. Whatever I publish on pornography and masculinity in the future will be heavily influenced by this book and my response to it. I’ll explain tomorrow, and in the meantime, check out Courtney’s post.
UPDATE: The thread at Feministing has a lot on the problem of fantasy, and Greg raises the issue below this post. Let me, as a prelude to what I’m gonna write tomorrow, offer these links to old things I’ve written:
The Full Frontal Feminism discussion continues in various fora. I’m struck this morning by this long, powerful, angry, passionate, frequently funny poem by Ilyka: Letter to a Puppet. It’s written more to a well-meaning commenter than to me, but I’m provoked and stirred — in the best way — by it. Poetry frequently gets things across to me that prose can’t. This bit is haunting me right now:
Moral triage was performed,
and some people
were just going to have to sit in the waiting room
a little fucking longer than they had been,
and they’d been there for hundreds of years already, that’s the really shitty part.
I thought that was sad,
and hateful,
and patronizing. That it was said in an earnest,
well-meaning,
conciliatory,
and no doubt civil tone–
well. It didn’t make ME any less angry,
let’s put it that way.
Speaking only for myself — not for Jessica Valenti, not for any of my commenters, not for anyone else — I do perform moral triage all too often. And time and again, as much as I say I don’t want to play the “oppression Olympics“, I do create “hierarchies of hurt”, saying “well, we can’t fight all the battles at once, so let’s pick the most important ones.” My instincts and my training, and yes, my whiteness, lead me to see the mistreatment of women (all women, irrespective of color or class) as the Greatest Crime. And I’ve been called out more than once for continuing to rely on the problematic Shirley Chisholm model, the one in which I get a famous black woman’s blessing to perform “moral triage.”
And let me say this as well: speaking only for myself and for no one else, I don’t think anyone in the “women of color” community has been “hating” on me. I’d like to think I can distinguish between being the target of righteous anger and being an object of mindless hate. In the blogosphere, I’ve been on the receiving end of both from time to time, and have noticed that there is a difference. Saying “Hugo is a privileged ass who doesn’t get it” is very different from saying “Hugo is a self-loathing mangina”.
Thanks, Ilyka. I loved the poem, and it’s got the chinchillas who live in my head racing extra-fast on their wheels.
In today’s New Statesman, Courtney Martin issues a brief, ringing creedal defense of feminism. If reason, scripture and tradition were Hooker’s three-legged stool of Anglicanism, Courtney’s three-legged stool is educated choice, genuine equality, and radical authenticity. It’s her explanation of the last that had me sayin’ “amen”:
Radical authenticity: This facet of feminism gets talked about far too little in my opinion. A visionary twenty-first century feminism should aim to support both men and women to be their most authentic selves in the world, shedding prescribed gender roles and really getting in touch with their authentic desires, passions, and ethics. Feminist workplaces, for example, would nurture both men and women having present relationships with their children and fulfilling work lives. Men should be empowered to express a complex range of emotions, just as women must learn how to handle conflict healthily and assertively and take care of themselves, not just everyone else.
The most exciting thing about feminism, is that it is ultimately about leading more fulfilling, ethical, joyful lives, characterised by more healthy and genuine relationships. Who could argue with that?
Yes, yes, yes.
In my Humanities class (focusing on “Beauty, the Body, and the Western Tradition”) in the spring, I’ll be assigning Courtney’s book. I reviewed it here.
I write too much tendentious, long-winded prose. I want to write like Chris Clarke, the subject of my most intense boy-crush/blog-crush. This post from Sunday on editing has me thinking and reflecting on how I can do better.
You look for an ending, and it is almost always obvious where that ending should be, and though the unpracticed often feel the urge to soften it, a good ending is of necessity abrupt.
Yeah, three divorces taught me that.
A wonderful list of links indicating the true diversity of the feminist blogosphere, provided by Mandolin at Alas, A Blog. This blog and its predecessor get a couple of those links, for which I am grateful. And I’ve got some reading to do!
It concludes:
Feminism is for lawyers (lots and lots of lawyers), writers (lots and lots of them too), scientists, engineers, recording artists, professors, students, stay at home parents, veterans, ballerinas, and veterans who are also ballerinas. Feminists live on government assistance. They are poor, and middle class, and the kind of people who know the difference between OKOP and NOKOP.
Feminism is not about reaffirming every part of your identity, or of mine. Feminism is not about burning these things away, either. Privilege exists within discourses of feminism, but that does not invalidate the privileged or the underprivileged’s claim to feminism.
Feminism is not what I believe. Feminism is not what you believe. Feminism is Feminisms, many and varied.
If you want the links, visit the post.
Actually, it’s the “enthusiasm not consent” post from July that’s getting the attention. Nothing I’ve ever written gets quoted as often as these lines:
“The opposite of rape is not consent. The opposite of rape is enthusiasm”. It’s dangerous because it’s shocking, and of course, it’s dangerous because it twists the purely legal meaning of the term “rape.” But from the standpoint of one who cares desperately about the well-being of young people, my goal in offering workshops like these is not merely to prevent sexual assault that meets the legal standard of a criminal act. My goal is to prevent that, of course, but to also offer shy and uncertain young people tools to prevent them from having bad sex characterized by obligation, confusion, and detached resignation. I always argue that anything short of an authentic, honest, uncoerced, aroused and sober “Hell, yes!” is, in the end, just a “no” in another form.
Looking through my pings, trackbacks, and hits, it’s my most-linked-to post ever, and I’m genuinely glad, because the subject matters so much.
More later, but I note that I’ve been rotten about linking to good posts lately. Here’s some of the goodness you ought to check out in your abundant free time:
Jeff at Feminist Allies on Living with Feminist Anger Towards Men.
Jendi Reiter on solitude and faith in Why Church?
Sarah on marriage, growing up Catholic and leaning to the Nazarenes with Taking Things Off Old Pedestals.
And then, read Lynn on interpreting the newest statistics about teen sex.
Recent Comments