Believe Them.

You should believe women.

Think about how immensely difficult it must be to talk about sexual assault. Think about our society and how sex is still seen as this unholy, unspeakable act of hedonism. Think about how women are objectified in film and TV. It’s improving, but it’s still nowhere near okay. 

Think about women and how they’re taught to be demure, soft-spoken, to take up as little space as possible. Think about trans women who mostly don’t even get a fighting chance in this world because there is a violent resistance to their very existence. Think about how they have to operate differently in the world as women because people don’t understand how women can still be women in a nonheteronormative/strictly binary sense. Think about how these women don’t get common, decent respect. Think about how people won’t value them as people- HUMANS. We must be better as a society.

Think about all those things and then think about the reactions you’ve had/you’ve seen to sexual assault when even a shadow of a doubt is cast on the accuser. Think about how the first reaction is, what was she wearing. Think about how she’s instantly labeled something fiercely harsh and explicitly, negatively sexual because she was violated. Now think about why it may take so much time for a woman to think about all of these things, have to weigh the backlash for an assault on their bodies, and maybe think it’s not worth it while the men go on to assault their next victims. It’s because society breeds an acceptance of this behavior. It’s because it’s too much to think about and even more to remedy. It’s because we’ve grown so accustomed to letting men get with abusing women, instilling misogyny into the core of American values.

You should believe men.

Think about how hard it is in a society that embraces hyper-masculinity to a fault. Think about how men have been taught to ignore or suppress feelings so as to not seem like ‘a girl,’ because femininity is the enemy in a patriarchal society. Think about how men are assumed to be the aggressor in any situation, especially in a sexual situation. Think about the rigidity of male sexuality and the continued stigma of the expression of love between two men. Think about how this dynamic is problematic. Think about how men don’t want to come forward because of this blatant stigma. Think about the church. Think about the many cases of abuse that have been denied or paid off. Think about how these very instances have made men and boys not even involved with the church see how abuse isn’t taken seriously in a place where you’re supposed to feel the safest. If there’s no justice there, then why even bother reporting sexual abuse.

Sexual assault is not exclusive to gender, sexual orientation, identity, politics, religion, race, creed. It has nothing to do with political correctness or policing rights. It has everything to do with respect. It has everything to do with valuing a human as a human and knowing that basic human rights are being scrutinized, analyzed, conjectured, but not thought about as THE BASIC HUMAN RIGHT TO NOT BE MOLESTED, TO NOT BE TOUCHED, TO NOT FEEL UNSAFE. It’s a basic human right to privacy of your fucking body and to feel unsafe in any situation because someone doesn’t feel they need to respect your body is intrinsically unacceptable. No one- NO ONE should be made to feel sexual assault is allowable EVER.

So, when there are men/women being accused of sexual assault. BELIEVE the accusations. Yes, there is that tiny percentage that throws everyone off, but look at that percentage and think about the many women in your life. Would you rather immediately negate their accusations and continue this outrageous cycle of victim-blaming, or would you rather give that woman space and time to share her story without instant judgment?

All the women and men who have been so brave to come forward have been a true inspiration and I hope this momentum continues so we can all learn and grow from this blaring mistake of our past. Unfortunately, the leader of the land has yet to face any consequences of his actions, but I have hope that these other accusations will pressure the GOP to do something right and good for once.

Locker Room Talk

This year has seriously been one full of surprises, most of them horrible and fatal. This year for America has brought to light some very serious issues that have been coursing through the veins of this country, mostly undetected by the mainstream media. However, with the way information is disseminated nowadays, it’s impossible for these problems to continue going unchecked in a vacuum. There has been an unprecedented conversation happening now about race relations and violence, the blistering effects of debt and rising tuition costs, and the exposure of rape culture and how it’s manifested in so many different daily occurrences. 

The latter is my focus for today’s post, as I am simply at a loss that a “presidential” asshole hopeful who has unapologetically spewed hatred for the past year and a half STILL has this steadfast crazy base that is now defending his deplorable view of women. After the tape was released of him saying things that, let’s face it, aren’t all that staggering considering his track record. So okay, it’s not that his super fans are defending him, it’s that the women who are diehards seem to be unwavered by his words. This is so worrisome on so many levels. More specifically how he’s being defended and how he chose to defend himself by saying more or less everyone talks like that. “Locker room talk” is not an excuse for boasting about sexual assault. It has opened up this Pandora’s Box of how a part of this country responds to unacceptable treatment of women, because they feel this kind of talk is okay as long as it’s behind closed doors, in “locker rooms.”

Speaking with such gusto about that kind of disrespect is indicative of how you feel about women, it’s not a separate occurrence. There’s something so abhorrent about the idea it’s okay to objectify women as long as they don’t ever know about it. Also, the way republican men responded to the video, first mentioning that they all had mothers (DUH) and wives and daughters as if not having these women in your life would make you unable to understand the pure chauvinism in the words Trump used. Don’t get me started about Billy Bush’s cackling and him insisting on getting a hug from the celebrity woman they met off the bus. Freaking so disgusting. Gives me the creeps. It reminds me of those times when I’m at the bar and I overhear dudes talking amongst each other about women around them. They go over their “game plan” on how they’re going to get the girl to talk to them and it’s never with something simple, like saying freaking hi. It’s always something weird and creepy, like, “dude you bump into her…” like they’re the Harlem Globetrotters of hitting on women. It’s ridiculous. 

The silver lining of this horrendous leak is the fact that we’re addressing the misogyny that has become all to familiar and normalized. 

No more. It’s time to take responsibility for the way you talk about women, men. IT’S TIME.

Behold, Ladies! The Enemy. →

I was on Facebook scrolling through my newsfeed of awkward vines, Buzzfeed articles, and videos with puppies & kids, when I stumbled across a post a friend jokingly put up that was a blatantly misogynistic list of things women need to do to appear more attractive to men. After realizing it wasn’t an Onion article, but something someone actually took time and energy to write in all seriousness-this listicle excrement.

I then did some digging and discovered the culprit who’s brain birthed this POS site, Return of Kings. It’s basically every feminists’ nightmare. The dude who created this insufferable garbage is named Roosh V., which sounds dangerously close to douche, which he invariably is. His Community Beliefs exude the horrifying ideology that plagues progress and makes you realize there are crazies out there among us, hidden behind computer screens intaking all of this nonsense, internalizing it, and later unleashing their vile harebrained ”knowledge” in all kinds of ways on unsuspecting women with a confusing confidence only a dolt with a small… mind can dole out without embarrassment. The Community Beliefs from the Return of Kings trash site themselves were more than enough to put me in a blind, raging frenzy.

The most painful “beliefs” include, 

“ A woman’s value is mainly determined by her fertility and beauty. A man’s value is mainly determined by his resources, intellect, and character.”

“Elimination of traditional gender roles and the promotion of unlimited mating choice in women unleashes their promiscuity and other negative behaviors that block family formation.”

And finally,

“Women are sluts if they sleep around, but men are not. This fact is due to the biological differences between men and women.”

Somebody get me a glass of water. i’m burning up! If I ever meet a guy and he mentions anything like this I’m giving myself permission to knee him in the balls. If I EVER meet the dudes who penned any of the articles on any of the sites including the “king of douche” himself, lord help them. I hope there will be police around because I’m going to need to be tazed or shot to loosen my chokehold.

Not to mention, the site bans women or gays from commenting. So, don’t worry, homophobia also has a place in this unbelievable realm of pitiful men. We’re probably banned because we can ruin their inherently faulty “logic” with one sentence, obliterating their prejudice, privileged little community where they can hide from reality like sad, pathetic cowards who probably wear crocs and shirts with flames on them. No, this is not a test.

“Women and homosexuals are prohibited from commenting here. They will be immediately banned, and anyone who replies to them will also be banned. This includes replying in any thread that they started." 

WHERE IS THAT GLASSS OF WATER?!

On top of that, the dude made books denoting the countries where it’s easy to hook up with women, though he puts it a lot less delicately, calling these anthropological gems, Bang Guides. 

KSDBJAKDNCKNAOFOWFIBIVIS;ek374y9u40owf0rg0t3

**BURSTS INTO FLAMES**

Why I Had To Stop Reading Ken Kesey's One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

I had to put down One Few Over The Cuckoo’s Nest yesterday because of the off-putting way Kesey refers to women and the black characters in his story. Calling the black guys in the book, “the black boys,” and portraying them as these hellish perpetrators of despicable things to helpless patients, using sodomy as a violent act to subdue and torture was appalling. Not only that, but the way the head nurse is described as a “ball cutter,” basically representing a wily feminine force whose only job was to dehumanize and demasculinize every man she came across. It made me wonder about his past and what kind of message he thought he was spreading when he wrote this book. Then it made me think of other authors and whether or not their past or beliefs should weigh heavily on whether or not people appreciate their works. Personally, I usually don’t mind reading books I know unapologetic racists write, because, well, that’s the nature of this damn American Literature canon. A lot of the writers whose prose I respect and admire were downright degenerates and heathens, slaveholders and misogynists but what they wrote was beautiful and devoid of overt tones of bigotry. However, if that shit does decide to pop up and become an unavoidable recurring theme, that’s where I draw the line. 

I have a threshold for bigotry, though it really should be incredibly unacceptable, but I love words. I really do. I love the way writers use words, divorced of their messed up beliefs, in spite of their unsavory lifestyles. I try not to judge people in general so why judge the writers I like, because in the end, you never really know anyone. All you know is what is written about them or what they say fleetingly in an interview or heresy. I get that. But I will be damned if I’m going to sit there and read about a set of “charcoal black boys… shining onyx”  or whatever. I can almost here how much he hates the skin color of my race and it makes my skin crawl. It makes me nauseous to think that this book is taught with such vigor and he’s held in such high regard. It makes me angry, because I actually like the book. I really wanted to read it, but the physical illness and fury that welled up inside of me as I read was something I just could not ignore. So, ef you Kesey. I will not fall into your clutches. Maybe I’ll watch the movie… I do love Jackie.

Instead, I will read Hunter S. Thompson a drunk man I can get behind…. for now.