OK, so clearly I've been more active with the movie reviews, but sometimes life gets so hectic that the thought of ranting about what pisses me off just exhausts me. But I am here to continue on with another thing that makes me oh so angry.
I don't know if any of you know (or care) about this situation with Ben Roethlisberger, who plays for the Pittsburgh Steelers, but here's the gist: He was accused of rape, the girl decided not to continue pressing charges, and there's a whole bunch of dirt kicked up about the NFL sanctioning him or whatnot. Honestly, I don't know the full details of how he's being "disciplined", and I do not care. What I do care about is how people talked about what happened with this girl, and how they talked about girls and drinking, in general. Allow me to show you what has been happening...
Susan Reimer, who writes Commentary pieces for The Baltimore Sun, wrote a piece about two weeks ago called "Old rules don’t apply in Roethlisberger case". Within this piece, she shifts the blame to the victim of Roeth's (I am abbreviating his name, dammit!) attack because of her drunkenness, and proceeds to talk about how certain girls act with their rampant drinking and, perhaps, an item on their person indicating they are "DTF" (down to fuck). The fault is on THESE girls, because one can only assume that if they did not want to be raped, they wouldn't be out drinking a lot or wearing silly things that allude to them being sexually promiscuous.
Reimer ponders:
"When does it become rape? The rules have changed so fast and to such a degree that the law and the older generation are without a clue, and it has become tougher to assign blame, much less criminal charges, which in Georgia come with a minimum 25 years in prison.
Remember when "No" meant "No," even if she had said "Yes" 10 times before or 10 minutes before? That doesn't work if both parties are so drunk they might not be able to identify each other the next day, let alone remember whether permission was granted the night before."
Allow me to clarify, Ms. Reimer: rape is when the victim says no, or is unable to consent. Yes, that includes being too drunk to consent. If someone spiked her drink and she got so wasted that she couldn't say no, would that not be considered rape? Does it matter if she was the one who dictated how much alcohol she knowingly put into her body? No. If she was unable to give consent/said no, she was raped.
Reimer continues: "Remember when a woman's character or sexual history was not relevant? But what does a "DTF" button say?"
It says that she has class and taste issues. It doesn't say she's looking to get raped, nor does it excuse the man's behaviour in this situation.
The supposed details of the story indicate, in every way, that a rape occurred. Whether or not it did is clearly important, but it doesn't matter in this rant. The way that Ms. Reimer talked about the woman has nothing to do with her believing the girl was full of shit, and have everything to do with victim-blaming, which is revolting and, sadly, rampant in this country.
A few months ago, NPR did a horrific piece on rapes on college campuses. The rape of intoxicated women on college campuses is hardly rare, but what is surprisingly rare is how often the men accused of said rapes are held accountable for their actions. What is even more alarming is that these men are often accused numerous times--same for Roeth, by the way--by different victims, and nothing is done about it (or very little). And it seems to be because of the way our culture views women who "party".
Jaclyn Friedman, a very vocal feminist, was asked to comment on a CNN piece about living in a "dirty girl" culture. The piece describes the "scary" trend that seems to be on the rise, described as, "Young women who are rude, crude and sometimes very, very drunk. Are we living in a “dirty girl” culture?" The piece questions if the adoption of frat-boy behaviour is a form of "female empowerment", which they apparently found some 20 year-old girl to validate. But when they quoted Jaclyn, I was appalled at this supposed-feminist:
CNN anchor: "She says women having fun and making stupid mistakes is one thing, but adopting destructive, raunchy behavior is, well – scary."
Jaclyn: “When it comes to sexual assault, most rapists use alcohol to facilitate sexual assault.”
This was the first time I had ever heard of Jaclyn, and I was appalled at what she seemed to be saying. Little did I know that it was CNN framing things to better suit their story. Jaclyn wrote in to CNN to set the record straight, and I whole-heartedly agree with her.
Our culture is still trying to hold onto this idea of women as dainty and fragile. Women are not supposed to act like frat boys, and if they do, they are clearly asking for trouble. There are all sorts of things women are told throughout their lives, starting when they are pretty young, about how to 'protect' themselves from getting raped: don't go out alone, watch your drink, don't get drunk, don't wear slutty clothes, etc. These are good tips, and are certainly important for anyone's safety, not just women's. But that also puts the fault back on the victim if she does not comply.
To quote directly from Jaclyn:
"Every woman is going to sometimes choose short-term fun – even "bad" fun – over the abstract risk that someone might do something violent to us. We're all human. We'll inevitably take risks to have fun sometimes. What's not inevitable is that men will do violence to us while we're at it. If you want to keep girls safe, holding men responsible for their behavior is the place to start.
For example, did you know that, according to one study, if alcohol is involved in a sexual assault, the assailant is slightly more likely than the victim to have been drinking? And yet where are the messages telling boys not to get so drunk they can't tell if their partner is consenting?"
Why isn't it troublesome that young men are getting so trashed that they pass out or do things like force themselves on women? Why aren't people focusing on the rise of "rowdy" men who are targeting drunk women? Why are we even talking about women drinking, partying, and "being raunchy?" Are women only allowed to accuse someone of rape if they are angelic? This double-standard is ridiculous.
This relates directly back to the NPR piece. And, furthermore, Jaclyn refers to a terrifying situation that NPR has covered in other discussions about rape:
Psychologist David Lasik from the University of Massachusetts asked 2,000 men over a 20 year period questions like this: "Have you ever had sexual intercourse with someone, even though they did not want to, because they were too intoxicated [on alcohol or drugs] to resist your sexual advances?" He also asked: "Have you ever had sexual intercourse with an adult when they didn't want to because you used physical force [twisting their arm, holding them down, etc.] if they didn't cooperate?"
About 1 in 16 men answered "yes" to these or similar questions. None of these men had ever been to jail or formally accused of rape.
This is the rape culture we face these days. Women are to blame because they put themselves in danger of being attacked, but why does that absolve the men? Alcohol doesn't rape women--rapists rape women. Each person has a responsibility to their partner to make sure sex is consensual, regardless of the situation. And excusing rape when alcohol is involved is something that is so disgustingly common that rapists actually count on that reaction when they target intoxicated women. I'm not saying that women shouldn't be at all accountable when they get so trashed that they become easy targets, but that hardly makes it their fault, nor does it excuse the people who decide it's appropriate to rape them. If a woman is drunk and making bad decisions, her body is a free-for-all playground? She no longer has control over it and cannot dictate who can have sex with her? This is how we treat these sorts of rape, and it has to stop.
I hate to keep stealing from Jaclyn, but she describes rape culture so well in this blog entry:
"Gossip blogger Perez Hilton is already suggesting she may be a lying golddigger. That’s rape culture. As this woman’s case proceeds, her body, her actions, her mental state, motives and her history will be put on public trial in a way that would never happen if she were accusing someone of kidnapping or attempted murder. That’s rape culture. When women are too afraid of being re-victimized by the courts and the media to come forward, and when the public gets the message that women who accuse men of rape are lying or did something to deserve it, the cycle continues."
This needs to stop. I'm not saying that every time a woman screams "rape" that we have to assume it is true and automatically imprison the accused. But dismissing the seriousness of rape just because alcohol was involved is abhorrent. Everyone makes mistakes. Sometimes someone gets too drunk and passes out. It doesn't give me the right to do whatever I wish with their body. It doesn't give me the right to take advantage of them. And, if I'm drunk, and I decide to do something to that person that I wouldn't do if I were sober (and the person is either incapacitated or clearly says no), I am still responsible for my actions. Drinking so much that you do something silly or cannot keep your head up is one thing--drinking so much that you rape a person is entirely different. And failing to appropriately handle young men after they engage in that sort of activity only encourages them to continue to victimize other women using the same tactics. It's time to change the way we think about rape and start holding people accountable, drunk or not.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
The Things I Have Seen!
It's been quite the gap between entries, my precious little pixies, but that doesn't mean I have stopped ranting! I just haven't been ranting here, sadly. Since I rebooted my film blog, I figured I'd try to get this one going again. I've been thinking about this post for a couple of months now, and I think I've allowed myself enough time to heal before approaching this topic. Ready? OK...
On November 5th, 2009, I attended the Tea Party (or is it bagging?) rally at the steps of the U.S. Capitol Building. I was not there because I supported the ideas; rather, I was there to observe and report. I will be honest-- it's hard to observe such a spectacle without any sort of bias. I'm pretty much at the center line in the political spectrum, and I roll my eyes at both sides when they have protests and rallies that I think are completely ludicrous. But this was a beast of an entirely different nature.
The Tea Party Movement, which, I swear to God, was first called the "Tea Bagging Movement" by the people who started it, is more than just a silly group of misguided individuals. These protests were sponsored by Fox News. Not "officially", but they sent their correspondents out to the protests in order to meet with people, let people know when and where their correspondents would be there, and told people they should head out to protest. It's one thing when the New York Times or CNN gives their coverage a liberal spin; it's another thing to sponsor a political movement under the banner of "fair and balanced" news. Believe me when I say that I hate both MSNBC and Fox News, as I think they are practically two sides of the same coin; however, this sort of behaviour is why Fox News will always be the worst, in my eyes. Some of their normal newscasters are OK, but that the entire network promotes itself as "fair and balanced", including its entire op-ed team (which is largely where Fox made a name for itself), is simply laughable. And that team touts their slogan about, as if it makes their twisted comments more truthful. It doesn't. Not only that, but Fox News used footage from a previous rally and claimed it was from this rally to show inflated attendance (footage from a couple of months prior to this protest, so it's not like it was just laying around next to the new footage). Fox has used Photoshop on people's pictures in order to make them look unattractive simply because the people in question had the audacity to criticize Fox or people Fox supports. There is nothing fair or balanced about Fox News, as an entity. It is the single most laughable "news source" there is, and every time I hear people praise it, a part of me dies inside (same for MSNBC, but it's a smaller piece).
Back to the actual protest.
One of the first things I heard from the crowd as we tried to get up the escalator in the metro station was (shockingly) a complaint. "Why aren't both escalators going up?!" one woman demanded to know. One of her companions logically responded, "Well, because some people need to come down here to use the metro, so they probably need to keep the other one going down." A third member of the party chimed in and said, "I'll tell you why-- it's because Metro doesn't BELIEVE in us. Metro doesn't think we exist! THAT'S why!" I had to stop myself from turning around and going, "Are you fucking kidding me? You're claiming a Metro conspiracy?! Metro can't even get its act together in order to properly carry out a conspiracy, and you actually believe that this was an insidious scheme to thwart the protesters' plans?!" I had to keep calm, though. I needed to stand amongst these people for an extended period of time and try to keep from looking nauseous so as to avoid suspicion. The last thing I needed was a confrontation by an angry "true believer". And, to be quite honest with you, I was terrified that such a thing would happen.
I was amazed to see how many people did attend, even though it wasn't enough for Fox News' standards (wink wink, Hannity). I was even more amazed by how brainwashed everyone seemed. There were no casual supporters-- everyone was in staunch agreement with every single speaker. Again, to be perfectly honest, that frightened me. It's one thing to believe in something, but to question absolutely nothing? That just gives me bad feelings all over. I received several confused looks as I scribbled out page after page of notes while never smiling, cheering or clapping. Every so often the people around me would enthusiastically agree with something and look to their peers for like-minded approval. I gave them none. I tried not to scowl, frown, shake my head in disgust, throw my hands up in the air, or scream out "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!" Every so often, I'd accidentally mutter something under my breath, only to realize with a tinge of panic that someone nearby might have heard.
I tried to move throughout the crowd to capture images of people and signs. Oh, the signs. It's hard not to give nasty looks when people are using images from and comparisons to the Holocaust in their protests against health care reform. These people have no shame, and I'd wager no souls. How could you possibly compare the suffering people endured in Auschwitz to the inclusion of a public health care option? How? Who raised these people? I was in a sea of the most offensive, disgusting dreck I've ever been exposed to (thankfully, because this wasn't nearly as bad as a lot of other rallies from other more extremist groups). Part of what made it so shocking was that these people really don't see themselves as extreme, but these rallies and people like Glenn Beck at Fox News are blending extremism into the mainstream. I wasn't OK with the Bush as Hitler images when liberals were holding them up, and I'm not OK with the Obama as Hitler images. However, this movement is making the Obama-Hitler image acceptable because that sort of extremism is becoming the norm.
One of the most amazing things about this crowd was their complete lack of self-awareness. Everyone was shouting about the tyranny we are facing, the freedoms and liberties that have been stripped from us, and how we need to fight to defend this glorious country of ours, and yet no one seemed to realize that they were standing on the steps of our nation's Capital Building without fear of being arrested or physically harmed for saying these things. I wanted to ask which freedoms, exactly, have been stripped from us--especially any that President Bush didn't strip (and that's not a criticism of him)-- but I didn't want to call more attention to myself. I also wanted to understand why these people were the "true patriots" when these are very much the same people who called anti-war and anti-Bush protesters "Un-American" for not supporting our president. (Likewise, I'd love to know why the left pulling the same bullshit that they accused the right of doing only a year ago. The two sides have completely switched in almost every aspect of their tone in this political discourse, and yet no one seems to notice. It's completely fucking insane.)
The crowd was, unsurprisingly mostly white middle-aged and elderly Christians (that may be more of an assumption on my part, but considering how God-heavy this rally was and how many God and Jesus signs I saw, I think it's a safe bet). Genders were equally represented. One of the most depressing thing was seeing people using their young children as props. This is the kind of indoctrination that scares me. Children at that age don't question their parents' viewpoints that much. Bringing your kids to a rally is unfair to them and, in my opinion, makes you a terrible parent. Let your kids make up their own damn minds as they learn new things. Unfortunately, that requires them to look at sources other than Fox News (more than one person held a sign proudly proclaiming that Fox was their only source of news). The entire event made me feel disgusting and sad. Well, except for one moment.
At the end of the rally, the song "God Bless the USA" was played. This is basically the right-wing theme song, I think. However, it is a song I first heard after September 2001, and it did help to fill me with pride in those dark moments. I felt that feeling again while standing in this crowd of thousands of protesters. I was proud to be an American because I live in a country where thousands of people can flock to its capitol at the behest of failed comedians (Beck) and sleazy media personalities in order to shout about things they don't quite understand at the top of their lungs, and basically act like complete and utter ignorant assholes, without fear of persecution. These people were allowed to be idiots--in fact, that right is protected! And that is a beautiful thing.
However, if these assholes cause us to elect Sarah Palin in 2012, I'm moving to Canada.
On November 5th, 2009, I attended the Tea Party (or is it bagging?) rally at the steps of the U.S. Capitol Building. I was not there because I supported the ideas; rather, I was there to observe and report. I will be honest-- it's hard to observe such a spectacle without any sort of bias. I'm pretty much at the center line in the political spectrum, and I roll my eyes at both sides when they have protests and rallies that I think are completely ludicrous. But this was a beast of an entirely different nature.
The Tea Party Movement, which, I swear to God, was first called the "Tea Bagging Movement" by the people who started it, is more than just a silly group of misguided individuals. These protests were sponsored by Fox News. Not "officially", but they sent their correspondents out to the protests in order to meet with people, let people know when and where their correspondents would be there, and told people they should head out to protest. It's one thing when the New York Times or CNN gives their coverage a liberal spin; it's another thing to sponsor a political movement under the banner of "fair and balanced" news. Believe me when I say that I hate both MSNBC and Fox News, as I think they are practically two sides of the same coin; however, this sort of behaviour is why Fox News will always be the worst, in my eyes. Some of their normal newscasters are OK, but that the entire network promotes itself as "fair and balanced", including its entire op-ed team (which is largely where Fox made a name for itself), is simply laughable. And that team touts their slogan about, as if it makes their twisted comments more truthful. It doesn't. Not only that, but Fox News used footage from a previous rally and claimed it was from this rally to show inflated attendance (footage from a couple of months prior to this protest, so it's not like it was just laying around next to the new footage). Fox has used Photoshop on people's pictures in order to make them look unattractive simply because the people in question had the audacity to criticize Fox or people Fox supports. There is nothing fair or balanced about Fox News, as an entity. It is the single most laughable "news source" there is, and every time I hear people praise it, a part of me dies inside (same for MSNBC, but it's a smaller piece).
Back to the actual protest.
One of the first things I heard from the crowd as we tried to get up the escalator in the metro station was (shockingly) a complaint. "Why aren't both escalators going up?!" one woman demanded to know. One of her companions logically responded, "Well, because some people need to come down here to use the metro, so they probably need to keep the other one going down." A third member of the party chimed in and said, "I'll tell you why-- it's because Metro doesn't BELIEVE in us. Metro doesn't think we exist! THAT'S why!" I had to stop myself from turning around and going, "Are you fucking kidding me? You're claiming a Metro conspiracy?! Metro can't even get its act together in order to properly carry out a conspiracy, and you actually believe that this was an insidious scheme to thwart the protesters' plans?!" I had to keep calm, though. I needed to stand amongst these people for an extended period of time and try to keep from looking nauseous so as to avoid suspicion. The last thing I needed was a confrontation by an angry "true believer". And, to be quite honest with you, I was terrified that such a thing would happen.
I was amazed to see how many people did attend, even though it wasn't enough for Fox News' standards (wink wink, Hannity). I was even more amazed by how brainwashed everyone seemed. There were no casual supporters-- everyone was in staunch agreement with every single speaker. Again, to be perfectly honest, that frightened me. It's one thing to believe in something, but to question absolutely nothing? That just gives me bad feelings all over. I received several confused looks as I scribbled out page after page of notes while never smiling, cheering or clapping. Every so often the people around me would enthusiastically agree with something and look to their peers for like-minded approval. I gave them none. I tried not to scowl, frown, shake my head in disgust, throw my hands up in the air, or scream out "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!" Every so often, I'd accidentally mutter something under my breath, only to realize with a tinge of panic that someone nearby might have heard.
I tried to move throughout the crowd to capture images of people and signs. Oh, the signs. It's hard not to give nasty looks when people are using images from and comparisons to the Holocaust in their protests against health care reform. These people have no shame, and I'd wager no souls. How could you possibly compare the suffering people endured in Auschwitz to the inclusion of a public health care option? How? Who raised these people? I was in a sea of the most offensive, disgusting dreck I've ever been exposed to (thankfully, because this wasn't nearly as bad as a lot of other rallies from other more extremist groups). Part of what made it so shocking was that these people really don't see themselves as extreme, but these rallies and people like Glenn Beck at Fox News are blending extremism into the mainstream. I wasn't OK with the Bush as Hitler images when liberals were holding them up, and I'm not OK with the Obama as Hitler images. However, this movement is making the Obama-Hitler image acceptable because that sort of extremism is becoming the norm.
One of the most amazing things about this crowd was their complete lack of self-awareness. Everyone was shouting about the tyranny we are facing, the freedoms and liberties that have been stripped from us, and how we need to fight to defend this glorious country of ours, and yet no one seemed to realize that they were standing on the steps of our nation's Capital Building without fear of being arrested or physically harmed for saying these things. I wanted to ask which freedoms, exactly, have been stripped from us--especially any that President Bush didn't strip (and that's not a criticism of him)-- but I didn't want to call more attention to myself. I also wanted to understand why these people were the "true patriots" when these are very much the same people who called anti-war and anti-Bush protesters "Un-American" for not supporting our president. (Likewise, I'd love to know why the left pulling the same bullshit that they accused the right of doing only a year ago. The two sides have completely switched in almost every aspect of their tone in this political discourse, and yet no one seems to notice. It's completely fucking insane.)
The crowd was, unsurprisingly mostly white middle-aged and elderly Christians (that may be more of an assumption on my part, but considering how God-heavy this rally was and how many God and Jesus signs I saw, I think it's a safe bet). Genders were equally represented. One of the most depressing thing was seeing people using their young children as props. This is the kind of indoctrination that scares me. Children at that age don't question their parents' viewpoints that much. Bringing your kids to a rally is unfair to them and, in my opinion, makes you a terrible parent. Let your kids make up their own damn minds as they learn new things. Unfortunately, that requires them to look at sources other than Fox News (more than one person held a sign proudly proclaiming that Fox was their only source of news). The entire event made me feel disgusting and sad. Well, except for one moment.
At the end of the rally, the song "God Bless the USA" was played. This is basically the right-wing theme song, I think. However, it is a song I first heard after September 2001, and it did help to fill me with pride in those dark moments. I felt that feeling again while standing in this crowd of thousands of protesters. I was proud to be an American because I live in a country where thousands of people can flock to its capitol at the behest of failed comedians (Beck) and sleazy media personalities in order to shout about things they don't quite understand at the top of their lungs, and basically act like complete and utter ignorant assholes, without fear of persecution. These people were allowed to be idiots--in fact, that right is protected! And that is a beautiful thing.
However, if these assholes cause us to elect Sarah Palin in 2012, I'm moving to Canada.
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