Misogyny is a part of many right wing ideologies – religious fundamentalists and Red Pill/MRA/PUA types share it. And it strongly correlates with being generally politically conservative – if you look at the legislation agenda of the Republican party, it would seem that the only thing they care about is oppressing (women’s) sexuality.

One aspect of this worldview is the belief that the only thing that matters about a woman is her appearance. Religious men might cloak this in talking about a woman’s “ability to be a wife and mother” but often they simply mean her capacity as a sex object first and baby machine second. Red Pill types are far more blatant about this. Their constant drumbeat is that physical attraction is the only reason a man would be involved with a woman on any level. The generic Republican crowd expresses this when they insist that feminists are ugly, when they made a big deal about Sarah Palin being hot – to them how attractive you are is evidence of how well you conform to their ideas.

And no matter how poorly they react to a woman based on her appearance, they are more obsessed with women’s sexuality. Efforts to control it, either through sexist comments, legislating reproductive services or using “game” take up a lot of their time and attention. They are vigilant.

I think this explains some of the panic over the Rolling Stone cover featuring Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. There are several different reasons people are offended by the cover. I even empathize, a little bit with people who say that criminals shouldn’t get so much attention, that they shouldn’t be rock stars – that if they want infamy we should give them anonymity. But that’s not what I’m talking about.

Amanda Marcotte wrote about how people are totally losing their minds over the cognitive dissonance that a terrorist could be handsome. There are some people in the world who actually believe that real life is a fairy tale and that the good people are always good looking and the evil people are always ugly. And they can’t handle the cognitive dissonance.

But something else, I saw in the reactions to Marcotte on twitter was something far more sinister.

.@AmandaMarcotte Too bad this "book" didn't need the cover before he was judged for his actions.. You must DREAM of f*cking James Holmes.

— Brandy Charlotte (@FatBrando) July 18, 2013

@AmandaMarcotte You were with Edwards? Hmmm, you've come a long way, baby! (gigs) Dzhokhar is cute like Edwards, right? Start knitting.

— Thomas Fredette (@MAKEMINEMILQ) July 18, 2013

Martin Richard was a handsome boy. You're a piece of shit. "@AmandaMarcotte: Dzhokhar Tsarnaev *is* handsome"

— Sean Agnew (@seanagnew) July 17, 2013

@AmandaMarcotte Eric Robert Rudolph and Ted Bundy were more handsome. Ditto the Menendez brothers. Drop 'em a line. @TwitchyTeam

— Deserto Vulpes (@TheRobertBriggs) July 18, 2013

You *are* stupid. He planted a bomb next to a little kid. MT @AmandaMarcotte Dzhokhar Tsarnaev *is* handsome.

— Jim Treacher (@jtLOL) July 18, 2013

@jtLOL girls like @AmandaMarcotte find misogynists, abusers, emotionally vacant, & narcissistic men handsome…Which is why they r *liberal*

— notwhouthink (@shoopbeedoop) July 18, 2013

@duchessrebecca @AmandaMarcotte Amanda is still thinking with her #ladyparts.

— conservativemuslim (@rightwingmuslim) July 18, 2013

Next up from @AmandaMarcotte: "Stalin & Saddam had such cute hipster mustaches, like, so ironic! Also, you're stupid!" #tcot #BostonBomber

— Chris v Csefalvay (@chrisvcsefalvay) July 18, 2013

@AmandaMarcotte Ted Bundy was also handsome and he liked to kill women that looked just like you. But hey its image that countws right?

— Conservative Citizen (@clarkr3000) July 18, 2013

Amanda Marcotte @AmandaMarcotte does stick a rolled up Rolling Stone mag up her ass and has an orgasm http://t.co/Q5qFgriZ21

— DANEgerus (@DANEgerus) July 18, 2013

They are all filled with incoherent rage by the tweet:

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev *is* handsome. I fail to see what value there is in pretending otherwise. The bad guy isn't always a cartoon.

— Amanda Marcotte (@AmandaMarcotte) July 17, 2013

The responses I’ve highlighted above don’t simply fall into the “don’t glamorize criminals” category or even the “obviously villains are ugly, SHUT UP THEY ARE!” category. This line of reasoning goes:

1. Amanda Marcotte said Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is handsome.
2. Therefore she thinks he’s a good person AND she wants to have sex with him.

It doesn’t really follow, at all. But I would say that this conclusion does fit in with their warped misogyny. Men who objectify every woman they meet are projecting that women must do the same; if a woman says a man is handsome, then she must feel about him the way he feels about attractive women…!

This also fits with their warped view of female sexuality and the “theory” of “hypergamy.” Many men are obsessed with why women like “bad boys” instead of “nice guys.” Simply stating that an evil man is handsome must be proof of some deeper attraction, they think. And here, right here on twitter is a woman, nay, a feminist – admitting it! She must be punished! Don’t let her get away!

It’s not pretty to look at. But there is so much of it to see.

So, Chris Brecheen’s post has inspired me to relate a story that happened almost ten years ago.

Some of the women in the comments of that post related stories about how they responded to creepy men or stuck up for women who were being harassed in public. So here’s mine.

It was spring of 2004, I was in my final semester of college and I was out having a beer with two friends – a man and a woman – we’ll call them Bob and Jane. We were in one of the “nice” bars in our college town which meant that the tables and chairs were in good repair, the wood finished walls were polished, the selection of beers was excellent and IDs were actually checked. As we went up to the bar for a drink, two clearly inebriated older men approached us. They were in their mid to late 40’s and wearing suits, with their ties and shirt buttons undone.

“Hey!” One said to Jane. “You’re awfully pretty, did you know that?”

I had no idea that sometimes movie cliches appeared in real life.

Jane looked down at her shoes. They continued, asking what she was studying, if she had a boyfriend. She gave quiet, one word answers. I was fuming at how upset they were making my friend. I started thinking about everything I wanted to say to them, but I wasn’t sure how to do it without embarrassing Jane further.

“Ugh, these guys.” Bob said. “Let’s just go to our table.”

We took our drinks and sat down, trying to ignore the obnoxious men.

About ten minutes later, they sat down at the table next to us.

“Hey you!” one of them said directly to me. “I’m sorry we ignored you before for your friend.” I could write a dissertation on the absurd misogyny of that statement, but I’ll let it go for now. “You’re not so bad yourself.” I rolled my eyes.

“Yeah,” said the other one. “I mean, what are two girls like you doing with a guy like him?” he pointed to Bob.

Something snapped in my head. I was done caring about appearing to be a nice girl.

I looked right at him and said, matter-of-factly “He’s really good in bed.”

There was a beat and then the two drunk dudes looked at each other with eyebrows raised and eyes widened. These assholes thought I was being serious. They muttered an incoherent apology and I think they even nodded respectfully towards Bob, who was trying not to laugh. They left us alone for the rest of the night.

I couldn’t believe that it worked, but it did, and that was when I learned to trust my inner smartass. Joy Nash said that “the secret to turning staircase wit into regular old every day wit is practice.” So, if you feel it’s safe to do so, let go of your need to be the nice girl. Let the devil on your shoulder out when you need her.

Just as in Chris Brecheen’s story it seems that creepy dudes have no sense of humor or irony. My ridiculous and silly comeback rang true in their worldview, even though I was only trying to be obnoxious. These men are extremely insecure which is also why you may risk violence in provoking them. Use your judgment when engaging them, but know that there’s not much to these guys but swagger and inadequacy.

This post is adapted from a recent service I led at my Unitarian Universalist congregation. I gave the presentation with accompanying powerpoint slides, and have linked to relevant images in this post where appropriate.

The reading I gave before my sermon was from the Book of Genesis 3: 1-7

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made.
He said to the woman,
“Did God really say,
‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
The woman said to the serpent,
“We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,
but God did say,
‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden,
and you must not touch it,
or you will die.’”
“You will not certainly die,”
the serpent said to the woman.
“For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened,
and you will be like God,
knowing good and evil.”
When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye,
and also desirable for gaining wisdom,
she took some and ate it.
She also gave some to her husband,
who was with her,
and he ate it.
Then the eyes of both of them were opened

February 24, 2013 was Oscar Night. I settled in to watch the Academy Awards with some Chinese takeout and Twitter open on my iPhone. Seth MacFarlane was hosting the show, and I was soon appalled by his inane and sexist humor. No woman was spared, from those who disrobed in movies, to underage actresses he saw as targets for lecherous older movie stars – beat after beat came at the expense of women. Women who were victims of domestic violence or eating disorders, women who were sex workers, women he deemed too beautiful to have anything worthwhile to say, all became subjects of ridicule. I watched the feminists I knew on Twitter go through several stages – denial, then anger, and finally scathing satire.

I tweeted a few snarky comments of my own, and my enjoyment of the evening came more from blowing off steam about this chauvinist retro mess than the paltry excuse for comedy Hollywood was serving up. My mother and my brother didn’t get it. Why couldn’t I just brush it off or ignore how demeaning the humor was? This sermon is an attempt to explain.

Last summer I lead a service about the Unitarian Universalist idea that revelation is not sealed. As UUs we believe that there is no one holy book or source of information that contains all the answers to life’s questions. And in our search for truth and meaning, we have to admit that there is so much that we do not know. This is a huge responsibility. And this is part of what I mean when I say that there’s no going back. There are some things that we can come to know, that we can never not know again. Last summer, I drew a comparison to Eve and The Apple, and still today, I tend to side with Eve. I’d rather know than not know. In fact, later on in the Bible, in Isah 5:20 it is written,

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil

…And yet we were not supossed to know the difference in the first place.

In January, I spoke about the “Toolbox of Justice.” Social justice is like a toolbox, feminism, anti-racism and other struggles for human rights are not just political movements but ways to understand the world. We can use the ideas found in these movements both to create change and to recognize injustice in our daily lives. Once we understand that a word or an action is harmful to others, our conscience reminds us not to do it again. While some may remain ignorant about why a certain phrase is offensive, or how systemic injustice hurts people – once you know, there’s no going back – there is no excuse for passivity.

There is evidence for this idea embedded within our bodies.

The basal ganglia is a structure located in the base of our forebrain. Among other things, it is responsible for automaticity – the ability to do things deliberately but without much conscious thought. When people refer to something as “like riding a bike,” they are talking about something that can be controlled by this area of the brain. There are many things we can teach ourselves to do without much thought, walking, typing, knitting, even driving – if you have ever found yourself lost in thought and arriving safely at your destination but a bit startled that you don’t remember every turn on a familiar route, thank your basal ganglia. With even complex tasks, once we learn how to do them, we can never forget.

More abstractly, people have compared understanding the basic tenets of feminism to the 1999 Wachowski Brothers movie “The Matrix” starring Keanu Reaves.

And sometimes it feels that way. It did on Oscar night. I couldn’t ignore Seth Meyers sexist bonanza anymore than I could ignore a fire alarm or not turn around when someone calls my name. I can’t unfeminist myself, and I don’t think I would want to, most of the time.

But what does my experience have to do with anyone else? Just because I can’t go back does that mean that no one else can? I think there’s evidence that this is so.

Steven Pinker’s book The Better Angels of Our Nature posits that humanity has gotten less violent over time. Despite the horrors of the twentieth century, which was also the most well documented era in human history, wars in past centuries killed even greater percentages of the population than both World Wars did respectively. Slavery, torture and capital punishment have also declined over time as we have seen an increase in human rights worldwide. Pinker cites the enlightenment, widespread education and social movements like feminism as the cause of this decline in violence and cruelty. There is no reason to think that even though horrific acts still do occur that they are increasing or will increase in the future. Our society is becoming less violent, and signs point to it becoming more peaceful still, with studies of younger generations showing that young people today are less racist and more tolerant than ever before.

In fact, our popular entertainment relies on the fact that harmful and bigoted ideas of the past, are entirely alien to audiences today. This may be a bit too optimistic at times, but that doesn’t stop it from being a commonly used trope.

The movie Pleasantville explored the idea of how two teenagers living in the 1990’s would survive in a 1950’s tv sitcom. The provincial mores of the time were played both for comedy and shock value. However, the filmmakers were aware of the larger implications of this idea.

A more serious endeavor, AMC’s Mad Men plays the sexism, racism and homophobia of a 1960’s advertising agency straight, for dramatic effect. To identify with the female, gay or people of color characters on the show is often a lonely and desperate experience. But there would be little value in the great lengths taken to make the show realistic if our world had not undergone so many changes.

Alternately, the Star Trek television series and movies portray a future without poverty, or bigotry. Gene Roddenberry’s vision of utopia was flawed at times, but he sensed that social progress would only continue to march on into the future.

In real life, there are countless examples of how a small change in progress for human rights lead to bigger and bigger things. The integration of the United States military in 1948 was the first large scale attempt at racial desegregation in the US. Although it was met with resistance by some, it was a large victory for the African American Civil Rights Movement. And it set the stage for efforts to desegregate schools and other institutions. The experiences of white soldiers, serving alongside black soldiers contributed to changing ideas about race in America.

Harvey Milk, the first openly gay city supervisor of San Francisco California, famously encouraged his gay and lesbian friends and supporters to come out of the closet. He said, “Once and for all, break down the myths, destroy the lies and distortions. For your sake. For their sake. For the sake of the youngsters who are becoming scared.” He knew what social scientists would later prove statistically – that the number one indicator of a person’s support for the rights of Gender and Sexual Minorities was whether or not they knew an out GLBTQ person. Once someone knows that their family member, their friend, their co-worker or neighbor will face harm and discrimination, it’s enough to change their mind. There’s no going back.

UU Minister David McClean has spoken about this quotation by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther Kind Jr.:

“The Arc of the Moral Universe Is Long, but It Bends Toward Justice”

Reverend McClean said that he believes that this is not just a profound and inspiring statement but something that is literally true – a natural law of the universe. I’m still considering this. Sometimes it feels like ignorance and hatred bog us down as if we were trying to run through deep mud. Sometimes we get distracted and confused that we lose sight of our goals and fight with each other in circles instead of for one another, shoulder to shoulder. But when panning out and looking at ourselves from decades or even centuries past, we can see a pattern. Time and social progress both move in one direction – forward.

I don’t know who will be hosting the next Academy Awards Ceremony. But unless they have a time machine, I’m hopeful that it can only get better.

I’ve written before about how anti-feminism is an appeal to force.

A common MRA argument goes like this: since men are physically stronger than women, everything women have men could take away at any moment. To which I say, “No shit, Sherlock.” Does anyone ever think that women are ever unaware of their relative physical weakness in relation to men, even for a second?

I’ve been hanging out a lot lately at /r/TheBluePill which is a subreddit that satirizes “The Red Pill” a kind of super hardcore MRA/PUA philosophy.

They’ve added Red Pill Women, for ladies who agree that they ain’t shit. There I came across this gem by /u/DaddyMonster

Ladies… Men tend to find women’s lack of physical strength endearing. Arousing even. I know it makes me feel all daddylike.

Enjoy men’s strength. Marvel at it. Isn’t it sweet when you know that a man could squeeze the life out you easily, and he knows it too, but he won’t hurt you (any more than feels good)? He might manhandle you. He might be rough. He might even be very rough, but he will not truly hurt you.

A tingle of fear, safely in his strong arms you know 😉

Something that people frequently lament is that Red Pill effluvia occasionally contains a drop of truth. Confidence is sexy, for example. But what disturbs me more than how inane and misogynist they are is when they stumble on something really important and then completely miss the point.

Red Pillers frequently talk about how it’s so much more easy for (straight) women to get laid than (straight) men. They throw out stereotypes – “women don’t really like sex,” reveal their madonna/whore complexes – “women who are promiscuous have less value,” and appeal to evolutionary psychology – “eggs are expensive, sperm is cheap.” I’m not going to deny that there are social pressures on women to limit and feel ashamed of their sexualities. The difference is that feminists think that this shame is bad, and Red Pillers claim that it’s natural and good. They see female sexuality as a force of chaotic evil.

So “DaddyMonster” sees this fear women have, thinks about those who eroticize it and concludes that it’s all so very sweet. He never considered that this truth about men and women, this primal fear, is the reason it’s much harder for men to get laid. Red Pillers like to think that they know the truth. That women are “hypergamous” vending machines – say the right things “display high value” and sex pops out. It’s a lot simpler than that. It’s about self preservation.*

If anti-feminism is an appeal to force, pickup-artistry and game is an attempt to sell that force as sexy and fun.

UPDATE: In response to the question, “Why do bluepillers react so violently against our philosophies and methods?” [Violently, really?] DaddyMonster replied:

Merely poking or even beating it with a stick doesn’t work. You need to annihilate it. It needs to hurt.

Sharp sticks…

This is from the man who thinks that it’s “sweet” that most men could “squeeze the life out of” their female partners at any given moment.
_
*

*Via Dan Savage

Ron Lindsay, president of the Center for Inquiry began today’s conference with a bizarre opening statement. He started off by reading from 1 Timothy (A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man…) and people were snickering along assuming her was being facetious, but after hearing his whole talk, I’m not so sure.

Lindsay gave bell hooks definition of feminism, that it is “a movement to end sexism.” But then he launched into a strange discussion about how feminists disagree about what sexism is and danced around the idea that feminists frequently fall victim to a “no true Scotsman” fallacy.

Then he sunk even lower and broached the topic of privilege. He made some concessions that women and minorities still face discrimination, but quickly rushed to his larger point that the concept of privilege is used as a weapon to silence white dudes. I don’t think he saw the irony in saying this at the beginning of the “Women in Secularism” conference. At all.

Also Justin Vacula is here. And tweeted the following. Surprising no one.

@ralindsay is a #bravehero – pretty good opening remarks at #wiscfi

— Justin Vacula (@justinvacula) May 17, 2013

I’m currently on an Amtrak train heading towards Washington DC for the Women in Secularism 2 conference sponsored by the Center For Inquiry.

Although I don’t describe myself as an atheist, there’s a lot of overlap in the speakers an panels with topics I’m interested in: feminism, a critical view of religion, politics- especially with regards to the separation if church and state. Many of my favorite bloggers and twitter friends will be there too!

I’ll be tweeting and blogging as I can. You can also follow along on the #WISCFI hash tag. If you are going, let me know if you want to meet up!

It’s prom season, and so in the interest of the public, media outlets will be spending a lot of effort covering high school dress codes. These schools are teaching our girls an important lesson about how their bodies are valued. But, as so many have asked, what about the boys? What about the boys, indeed. This must have been an oversight – in all of the hubbub about short skirts and spaghetti straps, we haven’t even begun to discuss the things that distract girls during classroom time! There are so many things administrators must bar from our schools which are stumbling blocks for girls.

To do my part, I have drafted the following dress code for our nations young men. Because the groundbreaking Rebolution Modesty Survey did not include any questions for girls about what they think about boys attire, I instead thought back to all of the things that jeopardized my education almost 13 years ago.

1. No tight pants. During my year in Catholic School, there was a guy who wore his regulation uniform pants rather tightly. He was a frequent topic of discussion among the girls on the bus home from school. We really should have been doing our math homework and praying The Rosary instead.

2. No wearing undershirts as shirts. This was common when I got to public school, and was especially distracting for me. “Wife beaters” and v neck undershirts expose too much of the chest area, and are not appropriate for school.

3. No stubble. Boys must be clean shaven or have clearly defined facial hair. Boys with stubble would not allow girls to focus on their studies. It’s science.

4. No long hair. Hair must be short enough so that it is not touching the ears or shirt collar. A few of my friends were always going on about guys with “sexy hair,” and of course we have the cautionary tale of Angela Chase. She could have been a Rhodes Scholar if it were not for this dude:

4a. No hair product. Even students with regulation hair cuts can cause a distraction with proper styling. I myself made a juvenile joke out of pure frustration about having to share the library with such a rogue. It was something like “That dry look is sure making me wet.” Such a tragedy. How many young female minds are wasted because of styling gel, mousse and spray?

5. Short sleeved shirts must come to the elbow. Shirts which cut the arm at the thickest part of the bicep are too distracting.

6. Shirts with buttons must be buttoned all the way up to the collar. Unbuttoning the top two or three buttons of a shirt draws too much attention to the neck and shoulders and is inappropriate for school.

I’m sure with these simple suggestions, schools can make the classroom a place where girls can spend all of their attention on learning. We must teach our boys that it is their responsibility not to disrupt the school day with they way that they dress. This is a lesson they will carry with them into the workplace and throughout their lives.

Kathryn Joyce’s Quiverfull makes clear the inherent conflict between The Bible and feminism. Although the idea that this conflict exists is still controversial, even among feminists, this is the implicit message of the book.

Quiverfull is divided into three parts: wives, mothers, and daughters. Although the title refers explicitly to the Bible verse that informs a specific view of childbearing, the book looks at Christian Patriarchy as whole. Christian Patriarchy is a way of life defined by a strict interpretation of the Bible’s prescriptions for gender, marital and family roles – including that wives be submissive to their husbands, that men be the heads of their households and that children – especially daughters – be subject to their fathers in all matters.

The first section explains the Christian Patriarchy’s view of marriage. Joyce spent a weekend at a retreat of “The Apron Society,” an event designed to fulfill the commands in Titus 2, which calls older women to instruct the younger ones about marriage and family life. The weekend did not focus on improving communication skills or child care, but about Proverbs 31 and hospitality. What struck me as I read about these incredibly earnest women was a comparison between their attempts at “Biblical Womanhood” and that of Rachel Held Evans. Evans made her attempt to live precisely by the Bible in good faith, but also with a smile and an easygoing, carefree attitude. There was no friendly wink to the reader here. To the women of The Apron Society, being a good hostess wasn’t just something to do for fun or to be kind – it was a matter of their eternal salvation itself.

A disturbing undercurrent of Christian Patriarchy is that women’s lives don’t matter. This is made clear when Joyce reviews the writings of Debi Pearl, author of Created to Be His Helpmeet and other books about marriage for Christian women. Perl explains how women don’t need to enjoy sex, that close female friendships can be a sinful “spiritual masturbation” and that your life itself is worth sacrificing for the sake of being a properly submissive wife. Perl writes about a woman who came to her for advice after her husband had tried to kill her with a knife while she was pregnant. Perl said this might be grounds for divorce, but that she could also try to win him back by being kind and never speaking of the abuse again. According to Perl, once the woman kept quiet, everyone lived happily ever after. That this is extremely dangerous advice is beside the point. Perl sees nothing wrong with suggesting the woman risk her life and the lives of her children for the sake of her religion.

The section on motherhood was very different than what I had expected. I thought I was going to get a TLC like view into homes with dozens of smiling and identically dressed children, or alternately, horror stories about endless housework and abuse. What Joyce described was a group of people who worship fertility almost as much as they worship Jesus. When common sense or medical advice suggests something incompatible with their worldview, they of course side with their faith.

Christian Patriarchy is not just an ideal for family life. There are a set of political values and beliefs that go along with it. Conservative think tanks and churches have funded such projects as the Natural Family Manifesto the World Congress of Families, and the Population Research Institute. And these aren’t just places for conservative Christians to get cushy jobs. Their lobbying has real impact on the laws of the United States. Joyce does not go into the policy implications specifically – but it’s easy to guess what some of them might be. The WCF has lobbied extensively against the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and of course, CEDAW – the Convention on Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women. Within our own borders, PRI would like to make all abortions illegal. Reading through the parts of the book about these organizations made clear to me the links between theocracy, natalism and fascism.

The section about daughters is the shortest in the book, and much of what Joyce talks about is similar to what Jessica Valenti covered in the Purity Myth. Young women in these homes are taught to prize virginity above all else, to revere their fathers as the ultimate authority in their lives and to wait patiently to be betrothed.

Although Joyce meets many Christians in the book who are kind and warm to her, and some who seem like they are genuinely nice people, it was clear to me that their fundamentalism has elegantly solved the obvious conflicts between feminism and Christianity. While I think that treating women with dignity and respect is more important than leaving yourself open to charges of hypocrisy, the choice is not as clear for others as it is to me.

To be clear, I know lots of Christians who are also feminists. How they resolve their belief in women’s equality with their belief that the Bible is a Holy Book is something I don’t understand. It must require a complicated set of caveats and a faith so strong as not to be shaken by the conflict between their belief in women’s autonomy and the Bible’s decrees that women are unworthy. The Christian Patriarchy movement is by comparison incredibly simple. Dark, bizarre, harmful and hurtful. But as plain as the words on the page.

Amanda Marcotte hit it out of the park with her rebuke to disingenuous men on the internet, “If Consent Was Really That Hard, Whiny Dudes Would Fail At Every Aspect of Life.” She explained how everyone uses both verbal and non-verbal communications in all social interactions and there’s no reason why sex and dating relationships should be any different. The post ends with an anecdote about a teenage boy explicitly asking for consent from her. And this is an excellent point. If teenage boys can understand this concept, grown men have no excuse.

I have been thinking about something that happened to me when I was a teenager regarding consent ever since the entire “elevatorgate” debacle. I was sixteen years old and meeting a bunch of friends to hang out on a Friday night. Among us was a group of college freshman I hadn’t met before who were classmates of an older friend of mine. One of them was sitting next to me and he complimented my perfume and told me I smelled really good. I was surprised and flattered but not particularly interested. I said “Thank you” to be polite and then he put his arm around me. My body stiffened. I wasn’t sure what to do. And then almost immediately Mr. College took his arm away and said “Oh sorry, if that wasn’t cool.” It was awkward, but not really the end of he world.

Looking back, that an 18 year old young man can read non-verbal communication just confirms what we already know. Men can ask for a yes or understand a no. When they say otherwise, it’s not because they can’t, it’s because they just don’t want to.

So back in June I wrotea post about how much I love Garfunkel and Oates, but that “29/31” was really sexist for pretty much no reason at all.

And people on the internets assured me that they are totally feminist! And they’re just you know, making fun of women who worry too much about getting old/being single.

@misscherrypi My read: they’re making fun, not endorsing. Highlighting how stupid it is to assign women worth by age w silly dichotomy.

— Andrea Grimes (@andreagrimes) June 26, 2012

@misscherrypi Ha! Maybe. It’s definitely not as clever as their other work, but I don’t think it’s meant to be taken at face value.

— Andrea Grimes (@andreagrimes) June 26, 2012

So today I got around to watching, “The College Try”

This isn’t even funny. It’s just “Hey! Vaginas are gross!” It’s the same tired shtick from dudebros you can find every single day on Reddit.

Even though they lyrics say “I swear I’m not homophobic or anti-woman” this song is both. There’s no getting around it. The premise of the song is that women’s bodies are disgusting, and there is no reason for anyone to be attracted to them.

The implications of this “joke” have a real impact on womens lives and health. Despite the best efforts of health educators, some women still use douches which evidence suggests increases the risk of pelvic inflammatory disease and ectopic pregnancy. Even more seriously is the rise of labiaplasty and cosmetic vaginal surgery, about which the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have said

These procedures are not medically indicated, and the safety and effectiveness of these procedures have not been documented. Clinicians who receive requests from patients for such procedures should discuss with the patient the reason for her request and perform an evaluation for any physical signs or symptoms that may indicate the need for surgical intervention. Women should be informed about the lack of data supporting the efficacy of these procedures and their potential complications, including infection, altered sensation, dyspareunia, adhesions, and scarring.

And while that quotation was from 2007, there’s no reason to think that things have gotten any better. Kirsten O’Regan reports at Guernica Mag about “The Barbie”:

Dr. Red Alinsod, a urogynecologist in Laguna Beach, California, claims that his most requested surgical procedure is the Barbie: a procedure that excises the entire labia minora. This results in a “clamshell” aesthetic: a smooth genital area, the outer labia appearing “sealed” together with no labia minora protrusion. Alinsod tells me he invented the Barbie in 2005. “I had been doing more conservative labiaplasties before then,” he says. “But I kept getting patients who wanted almost all of it off. They would come in and say, I want a ‘Barbie.’ So I developed a procedure that would give them this comfortable, athletic, petite look, safely.”

So while Garfunkel and Oates aren’t telling women to fill their vaginas with vinegar or get their labia chopped off, how this song made it past pipe dream phase is beyond me. There are enough people in our culture telling women to hate their bodies. We don’t need to hear it from anyone else.