~ from “Gender Bias in College Admissions Tests,” FairTest.org
]]>right away if a writer’s a woman
or a man—the difference
being her narrowness of scope
and excess sentimentality; his
universality and grandness of theme,
his liberty and largesse.
But I’m not at all impressed
by these men I’ve been reading—
with their endless, melancholy verses
about sex with a prostitute
and their appointment of women
as symbols—the woman, a woman,
a woman’s hair, a woman’s voice, a woman’s hand—
oh, it goes on and on. The Platonic Form
of Woman like a magic, literary wand
waved over the page. A woman in bed,
a woman standing on a street corner,
women coming
and going from rooms, talking
(about great men, of course).
All it takes is the mere mention of woman.
And the whole burden
of the man’s psyche—
the whole world-weary, age-old, masterly, genius
of the male psyche—
rises off the page like vapor from a mystic’s bowl […]
These tedious “universals”
that make particular only the man
and his struggles (poor man! how he struggles!)
with sexual satisfaction,
professional success, power, and recognition. And recognition
of his power and sexual success.
Even in its absence,
the suggestion lingers:
This man is a lover, this man is a man—
perhaps not yet,
but someday to be reckoned with.
“The woman” has seduced him,
or teased him, cheated him, or worse of all sins
ignored him.
Wait! Worse yet, failed to praise him,
to coo, whet, and lick
his potential. […]
I’ve sent my verses about fucking
men to the editors again and again.
And those guys keep rejecting me,
my poem, my gender.
(Or is it the sex?) Now, thanks to Naipaul,
the truth is out: They can tell in a second
my sex by my topic, by my subject.
But I’ve grown to suspect that rather
it’s my perspective
on the very same subject
to which they object.
So here’s the easy rejoinder:
I’m just being reactionary.
This is simpleminded ressentiment.
(Yeah, leave it to Nietzsche
to make all reaction effete,
all women sheep.)
But don’t fail to notice
that saying that is reaction, too,
such an easy ploy: to silence
by making it seem that any response
is whining. (Go ahead, call me shrill.)
This time, guys, I made it easy.
Just read the title,
and you’ll know, like Naipaul,
it’s the second sex
you’re up against.
(Call it literary frottage.)
Then you can forget it.
(Tell me to calm down, while you’re at it.)
- from ‘Poem Composed While Waiting for the Gynecologist To Come In’, by Brook Sadler, in response to writer V.S. Naipaul’s comments about women being inferior writers to men.
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(via Feministe and The Brooklyn Paper)
]]>When: Sunday, June 19, 12-3 pm
Why: To draw attention to the fact that we still live in a slut-shaming, victim-blaming rape culture as epitomized by a policeman in Toronto who advised women that they should “avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.” ]]>
“Society has a problem with female nudity when it is not …”—Badu pauses to get her words together; she wants this point to be very clear—“… when it is not packaged for the consumption of male entertainment. Then it becomes confusing.”
]]>Girls get a lot of mixed messages—they are told, “Girl Power!” and what does that mean? It means you wear a T-shirt that says “Girl Power!” but you call each other bitches. You make fun of a girl for being a virgin and you make fun of a girl for having sex. There’s no right place to be.
My friends, we must guard against the hypnotic pied piper Hypocrisy. Let’s wake up and kick its snarky ass. If we want equality, respect, and all that jazz, we can’t wait for someone else to do it first. It begins with us. (I still want a Girl Power t-shirt, though.)
(thanks to lipstick feminists for the quote)
]]>Virginity and chastity are reemerging as a trend in pop culture, in our schools, in the media, and even in legislation. So while young women are subject to overt sexual messages every day, they’re simultaneously being taught—by the people who are supposed to care for their personal and moral development, no less—that their only real worth is their virginity and ability to remain ‘pure.’
So what are young women left with? Abstinence-only education during the day and Girls Gone Wild commercials at night! Whether it’s delivered through a virginity pledge or by a barely dressed tween pop singer writhing across the television screen, the message is the same: A woman’s worth lies in her ability—or her refusal—to be sexual. And we’re teaching American girls that, one way or another, their bodies and their sexuality are what make them valuable.
~ Jessica Valenti, The Purity Myth
]]>Novelist Margaret Atwood writes that when she asked a male friend why men feel threatened by women, he answered, “They are afraid women will laugh at them.” When she asked a group of women why they feel threatened by men, they said, “We’re afraid of being killed.”
via PBS.org, A Woman’s Worst Nightmare
]]>Inspiration for today’s Gratitude Post brought to you by an American Asshat in Paris Freed from the Idea of “Consent”, and its only-slightly-less-depressing rebuttal, The Sexual Reality of Being a Parisian Woman.
]]>Now that says something about what the folks of her day thought of women’s bodies. Granny couldn’t bear the thought of her actual (as opposed to conformed) body being detected, even by a good girlfriend in the middle of the night in the privacy of a home while she was asleep.
You could argue that this may be my grandma’s personal issue, and it is true that she was probably shyer than some. But she didn’t learn her horror of her natural shape in a vacuum,
Anyhoo, I ran across this today and thought it would be good idea to require all men to wear this not-so-vintage contraption every day for a couple of years. Just so’s they can get a truly visceral experience of what daily life can be like for women. We could cut them a break and let them take it off at night.
Oh, and here’s my beautiful grandma at age 20 posing for a wedding portrait with my grandpa, circa 1945.
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