"Get over it"

"It's not like I was raped, and it was an isolated event with a neat ending, and that was that. I was stalked. My best friend was attacked. I was left with scars and with PTSD. The enforced denial in my family resulted in profound fractures.

My experience is not terribly unique. Rape reverberates.

"Get over it" elides a reality that sexual violence is usually not a contained incident, but a starting point on a divergent path along which lie pebbles, stones, emotional landmines that one otherwise might not have encountered.

Rape did not turn me into a survivor's advocate; I was a survivor long before I was an advocate. But even if it had, I don't know why on earth I would want to "get over" that. I am not keen to abandon my position that rape is vile, nor silence my voice from speaking that truth."

http://www.shakesville.com/2012/07/on-getting-over-it.html?m=1

objectification of women

My gaze also communicates that I have the weight of capitalist patriarchy behind me. Behind my stare exists an advertising industry that objectifies women’s bodies for incredible profit. Behind my stare is a political system that seeks to regulate women’s bodies outside of their control. Behind my stare is a pornography and media machine that communicates in nearly every single message that women are endlessly inadequate, weak objects and that men are dominant, in control, and powerful.

And this has real-world effects!

At age 13, 53% of American girls are “unhappy with their bodies.” This grows to 78% by the time girls reach 17. Five to 10 million adolescent girls and women struggle with eating disorders and borderline eating conditions, and 90 percent of those who have eating disorders are women between the ages of 12 and 25. (Source)

Now, am I causing the women around me to hate their bodies simply because I am looking? Absolutely not!

But when nearly every single man stares or hollers at a woman while she walks past ultra-thin models in billboards whose bodies are dissected and distorted to sell a product, it has a compounding effect.

But in talking about this, we should also recognize that this hurts men too.

Is it the same thing when men are objectified in a Calvin Klein ad or when a someone stares at my body at the pool? No, simply because there is not the weight of an all-encompassing system of gender oppression behind that objectification.

http://www.rolereboot.org/sex-and-relationships/details/2013-04-the-difference-between-the-appreciation-of-beauty-an#.UYM7Ymg1pro.twitter

Appreciating Beauty or Objectifying Women?

In the days since this experience, I have thought a lot about it.  Why did I, someone committed to the antithesis of this reality, participate in the way I did?  Why did I not question the situation or the language used by the men there?  Another thing that really has stuck with me is that the women in this space had bodies that were probably the closest to the unhealthy standard of beauty that our society has constructed that I have seen in a long time, and it left me wondering, a standard to which I am sadly attracted.  Is this healthy for them?

I can’t say for sure and I can’t judge because undoubtedly there are infinite numbers of body types and I am not a woman, but I imagine that it could be unhealthy in a few ways.  To achieve this body type, I imagine many women would need to pursue one of two unhealthy courses.  First, they could eat very little while toning their bodies through exercise, thus depriving their body of nutrients and calories that are needed for everyday functions.  Second, they could eat relatively normally but work out so regularly that it could become an unhealthy obsession, working out every day to the point that it is no longer healthy emotionally or psychologically (even if their bodies are rather healthy).

http://changefromwithin.org/2010/08/04/appreciating-beauty-or-objectifying-women/

Sexism in Civil Rights Movement

"Baker did encounter sexism in SCLC that mirrored Rustin's political tribulations as a gay man. SCLC ministers resisted her authority, while King disregarded Baker's input on substantive matters. According to Baker, SCLC was fast becoming a "cult of personality" devoted solely to the upkeep of King's celebrity status. When she rased this concern with King, he replied, "Well, I can't help what people do."

Another woman on SCLC executive committee, Septima Clarck, affirmed Baker's point of view: "Those men didn't have any faith in women, none whatsoever. They just thought that women were sex symbols and had no contribution to make."

-The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

J’accuse? On women who “collaborate” with the patriarchy

http://www.socialjusticeleague.net/2011/09/j’accuse-on-women-who-“collaborate”-with-the-patriarchy/

Walking While Female: A Story of Sexual Assault in Broad Daylight

http://jezebel.com/5925786/walking-while-female-a-story-of-sexual-assault-in-broad-daylight

All About Male Privileges - a List

http://aboutmaleprivilege.tumblr.com/post/26721844679/heterosexual-male-privilege-is-talking-about-how

"Violence against women is as American as apple pie."-Gwen Moore, Wisconsin Congresswoman