The Case for the Sanity of Women

by Cherryblossomlife

There is nothing wrong with me–except I was born at least two thousand years too late. Ladies of Amazonian proportions and Berserker propensities have passed quite out of vogue and have no place in this too damned civilized world…here I sit—mad as a hatter—with nothing to do but either become madder and madder or else recover enough of my sanity to be allowed to go back to the life which drove me mad. [Lara Jefferson]

Early Wednesday morning, my six year old daughter was running about the house, tearful and enraged, shouting through her sobs,”No Mummy, No! I’m NOT going to school”. She refused to get dressed, hid in the closet and then eventually resorted to feigning a stomach ache. When I’d got her to calm down I managed to find out what was wrong:

Big Porn Inc

Big Porn Inc is a book of articles on pornography, many of which are written from a radical feminist perspective. The book was edited by two well known Australian feminists Abigail Bray and Melinda Tankard Reist and published by Spinifex Press. This post is my personal reaction to reading this book. Please be advised that this post contains graphic descriptions of rape.

Firefighters Group Sex Scandal Exposed

A culture of homosexual group sex has been exposed with recent allegations of ‘sexual abuse’ by some retired fire fighters against their colleagues. These allegations have given rise to a debate on the nature of consent within group sex between men. Some sources have jumped to immediate conclusions on the matter, blaring headlines such as “Brutal Abuse Exposed” (Cover of The Sunday Telegraph, Sunday 14th February). However the issue is far more complicated than that.

We need to take into consideration several important points before we make such spurious judgment on the nature of this so called ‘abuse’.

Rape is worse when it happens to men, reports the New York Times

Recently, the New York Times reported that rape is worse when it happens to men than when it happens to women.

“There is no arena in which rape takes place between men and women that it does not take place between men and men[.]”

Like women, men who are raped feel violated and ashamed and may become severely depressed or suicidal. They are at increased risk for substance abuse, problems with interpersonal relationships, physical impairments, chronic pain, insomnia and other health problems.

But men also face a challenge to their sense of masculinity. Many feel they should have done more to fight off their attackers. Since they may believe that men are never raped, they may feel isolated and reluctant to confide in anyone. Male rape victims may become confused about their sexual orientation or, if gay and raped by a man, blame their sexual orientation for the rape.

See what they did there?  Rape is “X” when it happens to women; rape is “X+1” when it happens to men.  Of course, the Times would probably deny that’s what they said if they were ever asked about it, but look, folks: the math doesn’t lie.

What’s “Fuckability” Got To Do With It?

so what does being “fuckable” really mean, in a world where men as a group are known to stick their dicks into anyone, at anytime, under any circumstance? most of us spend way too much time, energy, worry, and of course money on fuckability mandates, beauty, and appearing “appropriate” at all times. which not coincidentally requires an entirely different costume from one hour of the day to the next. for women, of course, not for men. women make less, but spend more. on being fuckable. for men. cha-ching!

Boys will be Boys

Not so long ago, I read about the child sex abuse scandal at Penn State, and the ensuing firing and arrests of men heralded as leaders of a community for decades, and a flurry of news articles like this one at Huffpost about the ongoing ‘Crisis of Masculinity’.  Poor dudes.

To be honest, I never thought too much about  bloke stuff before, not since that day walking home from school, I found my 15 year old baby brother squared off against a bunch of other boys, all reeking that feral pubescent testosterone gymclass odour after footy training.

Strong enough to peel your nail-polish and melt your mascara.  Really. A lot of ballet position postures and gestures, but with snarling, drooling, and bared frothy canines between the bum-fluff.  When I asked what was going on, my brother told me to bugger off, as it was “guy stuff”, and not to tell mum if I knew what was good for me.

Lest We Forget

ANZAC Day women’s march, 1984 (Melbourne newspaper photo)

One thing that distinguishes human animals from non-human animals is death rituals and ceremonies. One thing that made me a feminist, was the complete lack of human respect for women’s systematic ritualised rapes/deaths. In the early 1980s, I went to one of the ‘Women Against Rape in War’ remembrance walks on Australia’s nationalistic war day – ANZAC Day (April 25th). I was young, I had no idea the scale of the hatred and violence which would be directed at the women who marched way-back at the rear of the formal military parade, to just lay a wreath on the war memorial cenotaphs, in memory of our own war dead and injured.

Can Women Escape from Men?

If women as a group were able to escape male violence, we would not be men’s victims. Women as a group have obviously not yet found a way to stop or escape rape, wife abuse, incest, sexual harassment, or other forms of male tyranny. (Dee Graham, in Loving to Survive)

A new survey released in the U.S, entitled The National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, details the extent and effects of male violence against women. It is a nationally representative survey that assesses experiences of sexual violence, stalking, and intimate partner violence among adult women and men in the United States and for each individual state.

 

 

 

Who are the Perpetrators?

In the US earlier this week, it came to light that in the 1990s, two different women accused Republican presidential candidate and current front-runner Herman Cain of sexual harassment when he was the head of the National Restaurant Association in 1999.

Herman Cain denies sexually harassing anyone.

Of course, denial is tactic men in power frequently use when accused of using, buying, harassing, and abusing women. Consider the DSK case, the Anthony Wiener case, Silvio Berlusconi, Arnold Schwarzenegger, (he’s got two!), Justice Thomas,  and more. The list of male leaders involved in and denying sex scandals is exceptionally long. In all of these cases, we have examples of men who believe that they should, as a condition of their status as powerful males, be believed- even when they are lying.  All of the above men denied their abusive behavior.

Do women also make public denials?

Anarchist Politics Inform Occupy Wall Street

at occupy wall street, apparently anarchy rules: “dont call the cops unless absolutely necessary” carries the day with these revolutionaries.  gee, where have we seen this before?  thats right: the 18-year old male anarchist who claims to have kickstarted slutwalk baltimore also believes that the community should reverse-slut-shame people i mean men behaving badly into cleaning up their behavior, instead of calling the cops, lest a historical record be left to inform those not directly involved, and lest any actual criminal sanctions be imposed on criminal offenders.  in the case of one man who was observed repeatedly groping women at OWS, the community decided to hand this dood over to the police anyway.  the reason?  he was giving the rest of the much-maligned protesters “a bad name” by sexually violating women.