Monthly Archives: July 2009

On TV: More to Love

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Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while might remember that I have a weakness for reality television. Well, not much has changed since that last post: TV still sucks and I still watch it. Last week I watched—with some anticipation actually—the premeire of the latest addition to the clusterfuck of primetime reality television: More to Love. Simply put, More to Love is The Batchelor, except with fat folks. [I don't use the word "fat" as a derogatory word. If this is a new concept for you, check out one of these blogs.] Basically, Luke is a successful, 26-year-old fat gentleman looking for love with a fat lady. So they stick him in a house with 20 plus-size contestents and see what happens. There are eliminations, tears, catfights, someone probably gets married at the end, blah blah same old, same old.

As a fat girl, I was super curious about More to Love. The concept of one of these shows actually allowing women over a size 12 to appear on television as romantic and (gasp!) sexual beings is pretty refreshing on its face. Now, obviously this wasn’t going to happen without being somehow incredibly offensive. I watched the show understanding that I would be distressed by how the show portrays these women, and I was. But not only for the reasons that I was expecting…

Yes, there is the predictable shit that exploits the ladies purely for their size—on what other dating show are there multiple, drawn-out shots of women eating and talking about their favorite meals? On what other show do subtitles point out each woman’s height and weight everytime she is speaking? (Yeah, seriously, I’m still not over that.) But the sexual exploitation really really surprised me.

Ya know how on these shows everyone is always making out all over the place (or having sex with each other, if it’s VH1)?  Well, More to Love promises to present more of the same but…it’s a little different. The women on the show speak openly about how they feel their weight has impacted their dating lives. Some of them have never been on a date, never been kissed. Most of them express tremendous insecurity when it comes to their romantic lives or sexuality. Obviously insecurity is not unique to fat women—in fact one could make an argument that just appearing on one of these shows is a sign of insecurity, whether a size 2 or a size 20—but rarely is this kind of insecurity openly discussed by women on TV, and rarely does it manifest itself so clearly in the sexual interactions between the people on screen.

Other bloggers have also noticed the uncomfortable sexual dynamics on More To Love. Jezebel calls it “coercion” and Fatshionista offers the following description of one of the two first episode kisses:

the oafish Luke basically demands she kiss him, and she obliges after laughing nervously at the request. In the moment before she goes in for the lips, I swear, if the the word AWKWAAAAAARRRD was in the dictionary, her face right now would be illustrating it. And then, Luke suddenly gets really unlikeable, when he oh-so-casually mentions that he has to cut some laydeez tonight and TOTALLY UNRELATED but maybe she should kiss him again. She does, and I am caught between wanting to throw up and wanting to punch Luke in his smug face.

(You can watch the kisses for yourself at the Jezebel post). Melissa, the woman being described in the Fatshionista post, looks undeniably uncomfortable kissing Luke, the lucky bachelor. While watching Anna kiss Luke, Lauren—who is sitting right next to them—remarks that she finds it “intimidating.”

Sex is the name of the game on these shows. After all, isn’t physical intimacy a natural part of “getting to know” someone who might be your romantic partner? Of course Luke will base some of his choice on who he feels sexual chemistry with. But a number of these women simply don’t seem comfortable with these public displays of affection. Clearly these women knew what they were getting into when they signed up for the show, and clearly it would be strange if the show’s creators chose NOT to treat these women like every other woman on TV (i.e., sexual exploitation = ratings). But watching it here feels markedly different. It looks uncomfortable, it feels uncomfortable to watch. You can’t put your figure on it, but you know it doesn’t feel right.

Perhaps part of it is just the fact that it makes me think of all the young fat women who have been coerced into sexual activity before the were ready or with someone they didn’t like all that much because they so badly needed to feel attractive and wanted. The fear that “no one will ever love me” leading to “what if this my only shot?” or ignoring personal comfort in the name of getting some “experience.” Again, this isn’t specific to fat girls by any means, and a lot of fat women are super-confident, but considering how thoroughly our society can ravage their self-esteem, they seem (we seem) to be a particularly vulnerable community. Factor in the “she should consider herself lucky that someone wanted to do it with her” response to fat women who have been raped, and you realize that some of these girls not only lack support and positive reinforcement about their looks, they actually have to function within a narrative that tells them they should be grateful for any sexual advances.

With that in mind, More to Love—or at least the pilot—becomes a really painful show to watch. Not just because it’s clearly still plays into fat-phobia, but because you’re literally watching some of these women struggle with their physical/sexual insecurities WHILE some guy who is in a clear position of power shoves his face in for the kiss. I’m not sure how long I’m gonna be able to keep watching.

Attention Fanboys and Fangirls!

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Check this out!!!!

The Con Anti-Harassment Project is a grass-roots campaign designed to help make conventions safer for everyone. Our aims are to encourage fandom, geek community and other non-business conventions to establish, articulate and act upon anti-harassment policies, especially sexual harassment policies, and to encourage mutual respect among con-goers, guests and staff.

The convention experience is often a fun and rewarding one; we want to do our part to make it fun, rewarding and safe for everyone involved. Conventions can’t eliminate harassment, but they can reduce it, have ways to deal with it when it happens, and make it clear that it’s unacceptable in our fun con environments. Our campaign is based upon a three-part action plan we encourage con committees to adopt and adapt for their own con atmosphere and environment.

How cool is this?! It’s not my scene, but it’s awesome nonetheless. CAHP is an project of Girl-Wonder.org: “a collection of sites dedicated to female characters and creators in mainstream comics. Our goals are to foster an attentive, empowered audience community and to encourage respect and high-quality character depiction within the industry.” Sounds good to me! CAHP encourages letter-writing campaigns to cons and gives policy tips for con-goers/organizers who are trying to write their own policies (much like we do for campus sexual assault policies). They also have a growing Con Database that “lists conventions, their articulated position on anti-harassment and sexual harassment policies, and their contact information.” Sound familiar??? If SAFER had a sister who was into comics, her name would be CAHP. I’m loving it.

I’ve heard about harassment issues at Cons before, and it does seem like an obvious place for this shit to happen (as is any large gathering of people I suppose…). But for those who haven’t considered it before, the FAQ discusses past Con harassment incidents.

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P.S. Thanks to everyone who came out to the bar for happy hour tonight. The turnout was so so fabulous and we were really psyched to chat.

Updates/Violence Against Native American Women

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Apologies for the blog being relatively quiet lately—everyone is rushing around with summertime projects/vacations. A reminder though that for NYC-ers there are two opportunities to interact with SAFER off the internet this summer. Tonight we are holding our happy hour at the Village Pourhouse (3rd Ave and 11th Street) $5 at the door and open bar from 6 to 7. Then on August 3 we have our FREE teach-in for students who want to learn more about what SAFER does and how to get active on their campus. It will take place at the NARAL Pro-Choice NY Offices (470 Park Ave South, 7th floor) from noon to 2 p.m. Please RSVP to contact@safercampus.org.

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At the Feministing Community and over at Amplify*** there is a really great post up about sexual violence against Native American women. The statistics are shocking and the stories are heartbreaking. What the post only touches on a little though (particularly by linking to this really enlightening NY Times editorial) is the incredibly complicated position of Native women within the American legal system, and their lack of legal options as survivors. As N. Bruce Duthu writes in the Times piece:

One in three American Indian women will be raped in their lifetimes, statistics gathered by the United States Department of Justice show. But the odds of the crimes against them ever being prosecuted are low, largely because of the complex jurisdictional rules that operate on Indian lands. Approximately 275 Indian tribes have their own court systems, but federal law forbids them to prosecute non-Indians. Cases involving non-Indian offenders must be referred to federal or state prosecutors, who often lack the time and resources to pursue them.

The situation is unfair to Indian victims of all crimes — burglary, arson, assault, etc. But the problem is greatest in the realm of sexual violence because rapes and other sexual assaults on American Indian women are overwhelmingly interracial. More than 80 percent of Indian victims identify their attacker as non-Indian. (Sexual violence against white and African-American women, in contrast, is primarily intraracial.) And American Indian women who live on tribal lands are more than twice as likely to be raped or sexually assaulted as other women in the United States, Justice Department statistics show.

Federal and state prosecutors have historically chosen not to prosecute these cases and have failed to obtain justice for Native women. Furthermore, asking a Native American woman (who not only has the knowledge that the state has not protected her friends and loved ones, but also knows that the state has a long—often violent—history of robbing her people of rights) to trust a state or federal prosecutor is almost absurdly unfair.

It’s an incredibly important issue that speaks really well to the failures of the criminal justice system, particularly on behalf of women of color or marginalized women, as well as an example of racialized sexual violence. I don’t know nearly enough about it to comment extensively, but for more information I highly recommend looking at the resources provided in the linked post and reading Sarah Deer’s essay “Federal Indian Law and Violent Crime” in the Incite! Anthology: The Color of Violence.

***I just discovered Amplify and it looks awesome. “Amplify is a youth-driven community dedicated to change society’s dysfunctional approach to sexual health issues.” Check them out!

Because Rape is an Emergency

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I was riding in a cab the other night when this PSA came on the little tv in the back.

The nurse is Karen Carroll, who I interviewed a few weeks ago. From interviewing her, I know that this message works for New York because New York has funds to help rape victims pay for both forensic exams and medical care. Not every state is as good (although see some good news out of North Carolina), and it is heartbreaking to think about how many people experience this emergency but are afraid of the cost of an ER visit.

Weekend Wrap-Up

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So, Cara did an excellent job this weekend during the Blogathon. She put up 24 excellent sexual violence-related posts, which I highly recommend checking out. As Nora said, the posts are “a great crash course in how sexual violence intersects with other kinds of violence to affect different communities in different ways.” All 24 are fabulous and run the gamut of assault issues, including male and trans rape victims, rape in prisons, the rape of immigrant women, and the intersection of race and rape. Here are some of my personal highlights. Oh, and did I mention she raised SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS IN PLEDGES?!? Yeah, crazy amazing.

In other news, Samhita and G.D. both discuss the rape accusations (and media coverage of them) made against a Pisstsburgh Steeler’s Qaurterback.

Also, I was glad to see that this Fugitivus post got picked up at Mother Jones.

Goodbye weekend, hello rest of the week…

Blogathon Blogathon Blogathon!

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Guess what it’s almost time for? If you guessed “the 2009 Blogathon on July 25!”…well, you guessed right!

As I’ve already mentioned, Cara at the Curvature will be blogging for SAFER during the Blogathon. She has already raised $253 in sponsors which is awesome. Again, I will ask everyone reading this to please try and throw a few dollars her way. Not only can we REALLY use donations, but she is being so awesome by busting her ass for 24 hours on our behalf. She is going to dedicate 12 hours of posting to discussing sexual violence and is looking for post ideas. Is there anything you’ve been thinking about in reference to the issue that you’d like to see her tackle? Got an article she might be interested in? Let her know and then check out her blogathon sub-blog on the 25th.

Happening Now: New York State Law and Domestic Violence

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NY State has been busy. When not, you know, embroiled in corruption charges and insane party politics, the state legislature and governor have been debating a number of important laws that will assist women and children effected by domestic violence and stalking.

Here’s the breakdown:

Just signed by Governor Patterson and effective immediately, a new law:

“…prohibits employers from firing or refusing to hire domestic-violence or stalking victims, which is aimed at helping people gain the financial independence needed to separate from an abuser and take time off work to pursue legal cases.”

Also signed into law this year:

“One [law] requires campuses and colleges to provide incoming students with information on domestic violence and stalking prevention. Another exempts victims of domestic violence, stalking or another crime that jeopardizes their safety from the requirement that a name change be published.

Passed in both houses but not yet signed by Patterson:

Sen. Ruth Hassell-Thompson, D-Mount Vernon, Westchester County, sponsored two domestic-violence bills…One would prohibit that victims be required to contact their abusers as a condition of receiving public benefits and services. They often have to contact the abuser to obtain documents required during a screening process.

The second bill would require that court-appointed attorneys for children receive training on the effect of domestic violence, ensure that court records detail how domestic violence is taken into account in child-custody and visitation decisions, and allow prosecutors to charge alleged abusers with a second-degree harassment violation that couldn’t be sealed in court records. Cases often are pleaded down from misdemeanors to violations that can be sealed.

Only passed in one house:

Legislation that passed only one house would have prohibited domestic-violence abusers from lawfully possessing a firearm, permitted victims to take up to 90 days in a 12-month period of unpaid leaves of absence from their job, and clarified that criminal orders of protection begin at sentencing and not conviction.

And vetoed by Patterson:

…a bill that would have directed the secretary of state to accept mail and legal papers on behalf of domestic-violence victims who wanted their location kept confidential. The governor’s veto said he supports the goals of the legislation, but it would be too costly – an estimated $1.4 million the first year and $900,000 in future years – and potentially could require the state to accept and forward all mail.The state estimated that up to 2,000 victims would register.

Considering that “each year in New York, an estimated 400,000 domestic incidents are reported to law enforcement,” this is some long-deserved legislation. I’m excited by the progress and really happy to see the state spending so much time on the issue to begin with. On the other hand, it’s frustrating that some of the key components that protect women’s safety by legally preventing their abusers from reaching them have not passed—and especially frustrating that part of the failure to pass stems from a monetary concern.

I’m also sort of blindsided by the article’s repeated use of the word “victims.” I know that people who have been affected by sexual and domestic violence have their own semantic preferences (victim vs. survivor). Though I have often used “victim” when describing incidents here, I prefer “survivor” as it implies the active move beyond the assault and allows people not to be defined by their “victimhood.” No matter what one’s personal preference is, however, the use of the word so often in an article about law related to abuse survivors sets up a really obvious and unfortunate (and telling) power differential. The framing of female “victims” whose fate lies entirely in the hands of the state…

Anyway. There is some good news in the DV front, thankfully. h/t to My Sister’s Place’s twitter

Because Being A Savior Implies A Gross Power Hierarchy Anyway

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I’d really like to direct some attention to this piece at altmuslimah, “The Dos and Don’ts of Defending Muslim Women.” One of my biggest criticisms of western feminism (as a western feminist myself) is the consistent use of racist tropes to “defend” or speak out on behalf of “non-western” women. I understand that this is usually done with the best of intentions and a true desire to ensure that women everywhere are healthy and able to make their own decisions and pursue opportunity. However, repeatedly demonizing the culture a woman has grown up in and may very well value, as well as demonizing and stereotyping a group of men that might include her father, brother, or son…it seems like this would only cause to alienate her from both the “support” we in the west are trying to offer and the individuals around her that feel threatened by the encroaching value-system(s). In our post-9/11 world, no where do you see this happen more than with “Muslim women” (as though there is one kind of Muslim woman) who are constantly held up by progressives and conservatives alike as an example of what is “backwards” and/or “anti-American” about Islam or predominantly Muslim countries, marrying—whether consciously or not—the crusade to free Muslim women from their “archaic shackles” with our geopolical interests and interventions in the Arab world. I don’t know about you, but I really don’t want my movement associated with the latter. At all.

If those of us working toward respectful, empowering bodily autonomy for all men and women (please see Nora’s awesome definition of her conception of reproductive justice) really believe in a woman’s right to choose, we should frame ourselves as allies who are available to assist in the struggle that a group of women, or an individual woman chooses for themselves/herself, not that we present for them. So often the discussion of Muslim women’s rights in America and Europe is centered around religious practices or symbols (like “THE VEIL”) that as outsiders we simply don’t understand and reject as being oppressive (because it is “foreign” and “other”) without considering that there is not a single opinion within the female Muslim community on the matter; or on violence perpetrated against woman that we ascribe to religion as though it is completely unrelated to the violence against women that occurs in the U.S. or in England or France every hour of every day.

This doesn’t just happen with Muslim women, and this doesn’t just happen with women outside of the U.S. It’s something like telling a woman she should have an abortion because it’s best for her. It’s something like telling a rape survivor that she needs to involve the police. It’s the assumption that your values are best for every woman in every situation at all times, no matter what she wants, no matter whether or not she has even had the opportunity to say what she wants. It’s often bigoted, classist, victimizing, and it needs to stop.

I’ll drink to that!

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It’s been a while since I’ve gotten to post, I fell and broke my arm a little over a week ago, and typing one-handed is not fun. Not to do any gratuitous product placements, but my new voice recognition software is so cool! (Dragon NaturallySpeaking if you’re curious.) So I thought I might take it for a little spin, and do a short post about one of my favorite obsessions – strengthening the connections between the antiviolence and reproductive rights movements.

I stopped by the Repro Health Happy Hour tonight, which always fills me with joy! It’s so important that those of us whose interests and causes overlap to take the time to meet each other, to talk, to listen, and to learn. It’s so easy to get involved in your own projects and forget how many other facets there are to what you do.

Part of why I admire the Repro Health Happy Hour so much is because it’s such a simple idea and so easy to organize and yet it has the potential to create so much strength within our movement. For those of you who are not New Yorkers or who, like me until not too long ago, don’t yet know about the happy hour, it is a monthly event organized by two women who are passionate about reproductive justice. It is not affiliated with any organization and it’s open to anyone who’s interested in these issues whether or not you actually work in the field. There is no charge and they move the location every month to try to make it as available as possible to as many people as possible. The idea here is simply to meet and talk with people who share your interests and your commitment and see what kind of connections are made.

This idea is very easily adapted to a college campus, particularly if you have the patience to let it run for a few months without worrying too much if you get more than four or five people who show up. This sort of event needs a little bit of time to build, but it’s a great way to introduce the campus choice group to the campus anti-rape group to the radical black women’s group to the law students for reproductive justice group. It’s key, of course, to remember to be welcoming of everyone who comes by, and not let the happy hour or social hour or coffee break or whatever you choose to call it devolve into a clique or just another club meeting!

I think it’s particularly important for people like me whose formal affiliation, if you can call a volunteer Board of Directors a formal affiliation, is with the antiviolence movement, to attend events under the Reproductive Health or Reproductive Rights or Reproductive Justice framework.* Because our movements are deeply interconnected at their philosophical base — they are about who controls women’s sexuality, about the need for women to control their own sexuality. Too often we, like much of the progressive movement, develop a narrow focus on our area of expertise, and we lose both the richness to be gained in learning from others and the strength to be found in uniting with others.

The idea for me is to build a broad-based movement for a culture of respectful sex — sex without violence, sex with autonomy for both partners, sex unrestrained by traditional gender norms that now seem to squeeze both men and women into boxes they don’t want to be in, sex with care for your partner (no matter how long or short that relationship might be). To really do that we need to be talking about sex ed and contraception and an end to rape, as well as the economic and racial oppressions or privileges that intersect with our sex lives, and although we accomplish a lot separately, sometimes we need to come together — even if it’s just for the camaraderie of a shared beer and a shared smile over our willingness to tackle this huge challenge!

*One of the major goals of the women who rethought the reproductive rights movement and created the reproductive justice framework was to create this kind of cross-issue, broad-based movement. SAFER is proud to call itself a reproductive justice organization and to be part of Third Wave’s national reproductive justice network. You can read more about the history and philosophy of reproductive justice here.

Linkage!

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First of all, can I just say: FUCK YEAH, JIMMY CARTER!

I didn’t even know about the first 19, but this is awesome: at Loserdust, Feminist Carnival of Sexual Freedom and Autonomy #20.

Powerful personal stories (triggers) and the pervasiveness of “not rape” at Shakesville and o filthy grandeur!

The Gender Blender Blog gets it right on college sexual assault policies.

Youth4Change calls out some victim-blaming.

At abyss2hope is an outrageous story of a Kansas attorney who did not choose to prosecute a rape that took place at a party in 2007, but DID choose to show pictures of the assault to parents of other party-goers as evidence of underage drinking.

And finally, I am excited by fbomb, a new blog for teenage feminists. Where were you 10 years ago when I needed you, fbomb???