on gatekeeping and ownership

For people without cable, we sure do watch a lot of television.

One of our current favorite shows is Leverage.  It's a con/heist show that somehow manages to be compelling despite the overwhelming volume of other con/heist entertainment out there.  It's available on Netflix, is really quite good, and you should watch it.

Anyway, there was a particular exchange in one episode that I'd like to address.  In The Bottle Job, the plot centers around the young woman, Cora, who owns the bar above which Main Character Nate rents an apartment.  Apparently Nate kind of grew up in that bar while his dad conducted criminal business, and has been around to watch Cora grow up.

She's also a hot redhead, so there's that.

Exhibit B: Brawny Character Who Likes To Punch Things Elliott, the con team's bruiser, is a bit of a ladies' man, or possibly an exaggerator.  We get to see him chatting up models, mentioning umpteen bazillion sexual escapades in passing, and generally just being masculine and horny.

He has long hair, which I like, but that's beside the point.

ANYWAY.  BCWLTPC Elliott is firmly established as a nudge-nudge-know-what-I-mean charmer/philanderer/whatever over the course of the first season as a half.  No one has cared, least of all Nate.  The lad receives no pushback from his friends about this behavior.  To be clear, we've seen no coercive behavior, just slick seducer kind of stuff.  Oh, and he did have one serious relationship that he seems to have bailed on due to being too busy with all the superspy kickassery and stuff.

Enter Exhibit A, the hot redhead who Nate has known since she wore diapers.

Elliott, predictably, leers.

This happens:

Nate: Hey.  She's like my niece.  

Elliott: At least she's not like your daughter.  

Nate: She's like my niece.  So I don't want YOU to LIKE my niece. 

This is treated as a Final Word On The Matter.

May I register a what the fuck?  I am so so so so so so so so (so) tired of this.  Let's break it down.

1) This idea that you should only care about your relatives, out of all the female people out there?  This patriarchal display of ownership of kinfolk?  Is disgusting.  If you have a problem with Elliott's behavior, Nate, what EXACTLY has stopped you from mentioning it before?  Oh, right, it's because all those other women don't really matter, but as soon as this same behavior happens around someone you happen to have known for a long time, suddenly it's a problem.  And by way of explanation, you offer that she's practically family.

THIS DOES NOT MATTER.  If his behavior is out of line, it's always out of line.  Suddenly giving a fuck just because it's someone close to you is a really, really weak case that smacks of thinking you are the ruler of your female relatives Because Authoritative Man With Female Possessions.  Gross.  You do not own this person.

2) Also, and this is a bit of an aside, the bonus unspoken-because-it's-just-so-totally-obviously-objectively-true implication that it's 'better' for Elliott because Nate thinks of her as a niece and not a daughter, because of course a man's degree of ownership of a woman is directly proportional to the closeness of the genetic (or appropriated) relationship?  Ugh.

3) WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO POLICE THIS WOMAN'S RELATIONSHIPS???  Your friend, whose behavior in this domain you have never had an issue with before, is interested in your other friend (granted, it's at an inconvenient time because she's a bit distracted at the moment by being extorted by a loan shark, but still).  Said lady never gets to even know about this interest, because YOU, oh all-master Nate, have flexed your muscles and used the authority granted to you by having known her for a long time (!) and, presumably, being older than her and male (!) to Bravely Guard Her Sexuality by cutting off the advance.  By gatekeeping Cora's life simply because you can.  You being uncomfortable sitting with the notion of this woman living her life as a fully functional adult does not, in any way whatsoever, give you any right to demand that she behave in a way as to ease your discomfort (see pretty much every civil rights 'debate' ever, wherein one group is uncomfortable with the existence of another, and thinks they get a say in that).  She is allowed to live her own damn life as a grown ass woman.  Full stop.

An argument can be made that maybe he knows he's not her type.  We have no evidence that they've actually, like, talked at all in the past ten years, so no.  Maybe he thinks he'd be dangerous or a potential rapist?  THEN WHY HAVE YOU NEVER SAID ANYTHING BEFORE?  Nope, don't think that's it.

The only option left is that he's policing her sexuality because he can.  Because he's a man, damn it, and she's his auxiliary property.  Maybe he's 'protecting' her 'virtue.'

Barf city.  What if she really likes one-night stands with hunky beefcakes?  Would you know?  No.  In which case you're denying her something she might enjoy.  Or maybe she hates one-night stands with hunky beefcakes, in which case she can tell Elliott that herself!  Or maybe she wants his number but isn't in the mood right now.  She's, like, a person with desires and preferences and gets to make those choices.  

In either case, Nate, you can fuck right off.

in which I weep for humanity ( aka AUGH part two)

(Part 1)

Apparently a third military dude in the last two weeks who just-so-happened to be tasked with sexual assault prevention is facing charges.


I'm just going to quote Fannie, here, for summarizing a core issue so succinctly:

''War is, in principle and practice, the violation of boundaries, albeit for some purported greater good and even though the people waging it might be good people in many contexts. Having legitimated the practice of violence and boundary violating, it should not be a surprise that those who are trained in it sometimes fail to distinguish who is and is not deserving of having their boundaries violated."

Yeah.  There is that. 

AUGH

[Content note for sexual assault, and rampant use of all-caps internet-yelling]

Last night on my drive home from work, NPR ran a story about sexual assault 'scandals' in the military.  Apparently in addition to the recent sexual assault prevention Air Force officer being arrested for (wait for it) sexual assault, a Fort Hood Army officer in charge of sexual assault prevention and victim counseling is now under investigation for (surprise surprise) sexual assault.

Man, that's a lot of sexual assault in one sentence. 

So.  I'm not even going to address the main story, other than to comment on how I am amazed that anyone can talk about this topic without screaming.  

THE VERY PEOPLE WE'RE TASKING WITH PREVENTING ASSAULT ARE COMMITTING THAT EXACT KIND OF ASSAULT, OFTEN AGAINST THE VICTIMS THEY'RE SUPPOSED TO BE HELPING.  

If there's a better exhibit of why this is a cultural problem that can't be fixed by little sound bytes and lip service, I don't know of it.  Anyway, my hat's off to Melissa Block for somehow managing to conduct this interview without exploding.  

What I want to talk about is this.  The interview addressed the sexual assault prevention training that the military is running, and ran a clip from a bystander-intervention-encouraging video.  Now, I'm all about pointing out to dudes that THEM PERSONALLY not raping anyone at the moment is not enough.  This is not an individual problem that would be fixed if only we could weed out those few 'bad apples.'  This is a systemic, cultural problem, and the predators are depending on the other dudes' silence in order to get away with (and get implicit approval for) their heinous actions.  YOUR SILENCE MATTERS.  Speak up!  Don't let people get away with this shit!  So let's see what the fancy sexual assault prevention campaign has come up with to convey that women are people and you should speak up because predators will interpret your silence as encouragement (and yes, people of all genders are victimized at times, but this piece seems to be pretty heteronormative so that's presumably the most relevant message at the moment.  One step at a time, I guess, as much as I hate that these steps are even necessary)!

Here's the transcript (emphasis mine, and I've changed the names from 'unidentified man' to something more appropriate):

Dudebro #1: Check out Chris. He's making a fool of himself. 

Dudebro #2: Dude, that girl's trying to leave and he keeps grabbing her. Man, that's all we need is to get put on lockdown again. 

Dudebro #1: Yeah.

AUGH.   

No!  That's not... I just... I hate everything.

CLEARLY the ONLY POSSIBLE reason to want to prevent BODILY ASSAULT is because it might inconvenience YOU.  Not, like, because you'd be PREVENTING A CRIME.  Because gosh darn it, those pesky people might punish the person COMMITTING A CRIME, and that might be annoying.  Consequences are so tiresome.

Or perhaps more realistically, the people making this video thought that would be the only reason that would be accessible to, and resonate with, the young military dudes at whom the training is targeted.  They're seriously saying that young men are so incredibly devoid of humanity and empathy that they're unable to see horrific victimization as horrific, and so it must be filtered through a little prism that casts it into terms their widdle bwains can comprehend.  Namely, that the fallout might be inconvenient and might get onto them a little.  Because someone somewhere DOES give a shit about the victim and the crime, presumably.  That person (whom I guess we must presume to be female) might even see the victim as an ACTUAL HUMAN BEING.  But that would be WAY too much to ask of your poor little military dudes.

What.  The.  Fuck.

To all you male and male-identified people, why are you not screaming about this?  That is some of the most fucking insulting shit I've seen in a while.  Presuming that you are literally incapable of caring about another person, so the only (or perhaps best) reason for speaking up against blatant predation is because it might be mildly inconvenient?  Now THIS is actual real-life misandry.  And this feminist, for one, is pissed as hell about it.  Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, patriarchy.

about that letter

[Content note: rampant frustrated sarcasm in the commentary]

So a lady wrote a letter to the female student population of Princeton, exhorting them to snap up husbands before they left school, because '[they] will never again be surrounded by this concentration of men who are worthy of [them].'  An excerpt (emphasis mine):

For most of you, the cornerstone of your future and happiness will be inextricably linked to the man you marry, and you will never again have this concentration of men who are worthy of you. 

Here’s what nobody is telling you: Find a husband on campus before you graduate. Yes, I went there. 

I am the mother of two sons who are both Princetonians. My older son had the good judgment and great fortune to marry a classmate of his, but he could have married anyone. My younger son is a junior and the universe of women he can marry is limitless. Men regularly marry women who are younger, less intelligent, less educated. It’s amazing how forgiving men can be about a woman’s lack of erudition, if she is exceptionally pretty. Smart women can’t (shouldn’t) marry men who aren’t at least their intellectual equal. As Princeton women, we have almost priced ourselves out of the market. Simply put, there is a very limited population of men who are as smart or smarter than we are. And I say again — you will never again be surrounded by this concentration of men who are worthy of you. 

Of course, once you graduate, you will meet men who are your intellectual equal — just not that many of them. And, you could choose to marry a man who has other things to recommend him besides a soaring intellect. But ultimately, it will frustrate you to be with a man who just isn’t as smart as you. 

Here is another truth that you know, but nobody is talking about. As freshman women, you have four classes of men to choose from. Every year, you lose the men in the senior class, and you become older than the class of incoming freshman men. So, by the time you are a senior, you basically have only the men in your own class to choose from, and frankly, they now have four classes of women to choose from. Maybe you should have been a little nicer to these guys when you were freshmen? 

If I had daughters, this is what I would be telling them.

She's serious.

Okay, let's do this thing.

1. The gross heternormativity of this piece is appalling.  In this year of two thousand and bloody thirteen we're still putting together sentences like 'the cornerstone of your future and happiness will be inextricably linked to the man you marry'?  Really?  This makes too many assumptions to count.  Obviously all women (or at least all Princeton women) are straight, cis, and want to get married.  That must be it.  I'll set this point aside for now, and assume that she curated her audience to be only those straight, cis women who have professed a desire to marry a straight, cis man someday.  
2. Who the fruitcake are you, lady, to declare who is and is not 'worthy' of these young women?  Isn't that their damn call to make for their own damn selves?
3. Men can 'marry down' in intellect, but women are comprehensively incapable of doing the same?  I just don't think I have the spoons to pull that apart in entirety, and I'm sure someone else on the interwebz will do a better job than I would, anyway.  So I'll just mention a few observations.  
• See point #2.  
• Really?  REALLY?  We're going to make 'level of acceptable Princetonian training' into the new caste system where it's super important to snag a husband in a higher bracket?  WTF? 
• There are really no other characteristics that might, say, lead to long-term happiness or compatibility other than the woman in the (straight, cis) marriage being acceptably less than the man.  Okay then.
• She's willing to reduce the lived experiences of however many bajillions of people might have different educational levels than their spouses by saying that they'll ultimately just be too frustrated to cope.  The 'well, you could choose to marry someone using, say, your own criteria instead of the one imposed on you by this random piece of unsolicited advice' (paraphrasing mine) little tidbit is especially cute, because it's followed by pointing out how IF YOU DO YOU'LL BE DOOMED.  
• I.... I just don't even.  
4. Moving on.  Ooh, look!  We get a second criterion!  Apparently it's categorically impossible for a ladyperson to be involved with a guyperson who is AT ALL younger than she is.  NOT ALLOWED, Y'ALL.  I had no idea that by the time I was a junior, the freshman men were totally off limits.  Oops, apparently that boyfriend didn't exist.  I must be fabricating those memories, because here's this totally authoritative lady to inform me that my relationship defied the laws of physics or something.  And apparently my college-educated mother didn't actually marry my eleven-years-younger, high-school-dropout father.  Thanks.  
5. Ending this piece of drivel with an exhortation to be 'nicer' to men?  Really?  Clearly that's what we need!  Girls just have to be nicer to boys!  That'll magically fix everything like abuse and rape and the fucktons of little ways in which male-type-people are socialized to disregard (at best) or outright loathe all the female-type-people and their silly ladybrainz who clearly don't know how to make any choices or govern their own damn lives, while those female-type people are socialized in more fucktons of ways to put up with the shit and make themselves smaller and not impose and be nice.  This is rape culture 101.  

Look.  It's fine to point out that college is a great time for socializing because you're around a bunch of people who all share your interests and have similar levels of free time.  I get that.  I kind of miss that dynamic, and wish I'd appreciated it more when I was in school.  I miss the ability to magically summon a house party at a moment's notice, or randomly call a friend and meet them for lunch between classes.  Real life doesn't have that kind of connection or freedom. 

But it is categorically fucked up to assert that the only reason this is beneficial is for the purposes of snatching up a sufficiently-educated-and-older husband.  And that if you don't do this, you (as a Princeton-educated, straight, cis, maybe presumably white woman) have somehow failed.

This is not okay. 

Steubenville link roundup

Jim C. Hines responds to the bafflingly heinous quotes surrounding the conviction.

Crates and Ribbons asks when we'll finally get around to considering that women matter in this world.

The always fantastic and eminently erudite Melissa McEwan points out the obvious, and extends compassion to the true victim.

I already linked to it once, but John Scalzi has written one of the best summaries of why all this bullshit is bullshit.

David Futrelle chronicles noxious victim-blaming tweets regarding the verdict (strong trigger warning on these).

Rather impressively, likely as a result of the massive backlash from the original hellaciously victim-blaming and rape-culture-propagating coverage, there have been several much more respectful and reality-acknowledging pieces, even in mainstream media (or at least mainstream media blogs).