international women's day/blog against sexism
today is international women's day and blog against sexism. i'm getting this in just under the deadline, but i feel like this issue (the "women" issue, or if you want to be more specific, the HUMAN issue) is paramount.
think about this: violence against women is the most common but least punished crime in the world. (statement taken from the united nations facts and figures page on international women's day 2007 here) seriously, THINK ABOUT IT.
this is not a guesstimate, nor a "feminist propagandist statement," opinion, personal viewpoint, skewed research, et al: it is an indisputable FACT. ok, F A C T .
while sexism (individualized or generalized) does not always lead to violence against women, the systems in which it is deeply embedded perpetuate and exacerbate it. also, F A C T .
i'm sick of it. i'm sick of women being terrorized, objectified, tortured, stalked, raped, murdered, beaten, harrassed, and otherwise dehumanized and victimized. and that doesn't even begin to include the ways that women are denied basic fucking rights: over their bodies, economic status, employment, healthcare, autonomy, identification, children, creativity, personal space, etc. and i'm not just talking about white women, or american women; i'm talking about women all over the world, from all countries, religions, economic brackets, ethnicities, cultures, gender identifications, etc.
i really don't like to focus on the idea of women as victims. anyone can be a victim at any time in their life. but the evidence of women's victimization is EVERYWHERE i look.
in my own life and experience, which is only what i can speak to, i am tired of the men around me, in my town, on my job, in my circles, and further, not realizing how fucked up women's realities are. they have NO FUCKING CLUE or even a smidgen of a clue about the extent to which gender terrorism invades our lives when we are doing even the most mundane of activities: walking down the street, fixing our bikes, buying groceries, riding public transportation, going to a show, hanging out with our friends, relaxing in our own homes.
the system exists in order to prop itself up and perpetuate the notion that women are less human, less intelligent, less rational, less in general. thereby giving sanction to the violence and degradation of women worldwide. while the men in our lives may often see news articles about domestic violence, rape, war, labor abuses, the wage gap, sexual trafficking, and on and on, i rarely see any men connecting the dots and seeing how these issues and beyond start to form a web in which women are entangled and that the very institutions that are supposed to protect and serve them perpetuate. a single news article about a "domestic dispute" or a pregnant woman killed by her partner or the abuse of children are all single, personalized incidents to them, not connected in any real way. BUT THEY FUCKING ARE. just because one happened to a woman down the street and the other happened to a woman in indonesia doesn't make them fundamentally different. they exist within an institutionalized context, not a vacuum.
recently, a story i read in a zine went something like this: a guy hanging with some people had a busted and bike couldn't fix it, so a girl who was hanging out (the writer) with this group of people offered to fix it. because the guy was embarrassed to have a girl fixing his shit, he then proceeded to objectify her to his friends, pretending that he had a video camera in his hands and that he was filming her. he started talking about what a "hot" porno video it would be if it was just "chicks fixing bikes" naked or something. then all his friends got in on the action, further objectifying this girl who was nice enough to even offer to fix this douchebag's bike. eventually, she walked away in disgust and distress. no other male around spoke up to tell these guys how fucked up their behavior and words were. no one said that maybe their thinking on the issue of women having technical skills was archaic and regressive. no one said, hey what the fuck is your problem. no one around stopped their harassment of her. these guys were supposed to be "anarchists," leftists, punk rockers, progressives, whatever. BULLSHIT.
i see this story as sort of symptomatic of sexism as a whole. although these guys were "joking," (you know, cause she must've been a humorless feminist, har har) their intoning this fucked up little fantasy, egging each other on, and falling in line makes them just like all the other shithole men who think they can objectify, abuse, use, degrade, and dehumanize women. as i said in the beginning of this entry, although sexist beliefs and behavior do not necessarily lead to violence, it is just this type of thinking that condones and begins to put into action that very violence of which women worldwide bear the brunt.
i work everyday to combat the sexist shit that i see. i cannot separate sexism and my existence. it is what i live in, what i see, what i hear, what i experience every fucking day. i don't ever get a break from it. i don't ever experience a day without it. i cannot just not think about it. it is there at every turn, at each moment, in a multiplicity of ways. often disguised and complex, called something different than it is, but always the same. and i am fucking privileged as shit. i fight the fight because i can, because there are women out there DYING and SUFFERING because they simply try to EXIST. so, if you're wondering why i'm such a fucking bitch, these are just a few of the reasons.
think about this: violence against women is the most common but least punished crime in the world. (statement taken from the united nations facts and figures page on international women's day 2007 here) seriously, THINK ABOUT IT.
this is not a guesstimate, nor a "feminist propagandist statement," opinion, personal viewpoint, skewed research, et al: it is an indisputable FACT. ok, F A C T .
while sexism (individualized or generalized) does not always lead to violence against women, the systems in which it is deeply embedded perpetuate and exacerbate it. also, F A C T .
i'm sick of it. i'm sick of women being terrorized, objectified, tortured, stalked, raped, murdered, beaten, harrassed, and otherwise dehumanized and victimized. and that doesn't even begin to include the ways that women are denied basic fucking rights: over their bodies, economic status, employment, healthcare, autonomy, identification, children, creativity, personal space, etc. and i'm not just talking about white women, or american women; i'm talking about women all over the world, from all countries, religions, economic brackets, ethnicities, cultures, gender identifications, etc.
i really don't like to focus on the idea of women as victims. anyone can be a victim at any time in their life. but the evidence of women's victimization is EVERYWHERE i look.
in my own life and experience, which is only what i can speak to, i am tired of the men around me, in my town, on my job, in my circles, and further, not realizing how fucked up women's realities are. they have NO FUCKING CLUE or even a smidgen of a clue about the extent to which gender terrorism invades our lives when we are doing even the most mundane of activities: walking down the street, fixing our bikes, buying groceries, riding public transportation, going to a show, hanging out with our friends, relaxing in our own homes.
the system exists in order to prop itself up and perpetuate the notion that women are less human, less intelligent, less rational, less in general. thereby giving sanction to the violence and degradation of women worldwide. while the men in our lives may often see news articles about domestic violence, rape, war, labor abuses, the wage gap, sexual trafficking, and on and on, i rarely see any men connecting the dots and seeing how these issues and beyond start to form a web in which women are entangled and that the very institutions that are supposed to protect and serve them perpetuate. a single news article about a "domestic dispute" or a pregnant woman killed by her partner or the abuse of children are all single, personalized incidents to them, not connected in any real way. BUT THEY FUCKING ARE. just because one happened to a woman down the street and the other happened to a woman in indonesia doesn't make them fundamentally different. they exist within an institutionalized context, not a vacuum.
recently, a story i read in a zine went something like this: a guy hanging with some people had a busted and bike couldn't fix it, so a girl who was hanging out (the writer) with this group of people offered to fix it. because the guy was embarrassed to have a girl fixing his shit, he then proceeded to objectify her to his friends, pretending that he had a video camera in his hands and that he was filming her. he started talking about what a "hot" porno video it would be if it was just "chicks fixing bikes" naked or something. then all his friends got in on the action, further objectifying this girl who was nice enough to even offer to fix this douchebag's bike. eventually, she walked away in disgust and distress. no other male around spoke up to tell these guys how fucked up their behavior and words were. no one said that maybe their thinking on the issue of women having technical skills was archaic and regressive. no one said, hey what the fuck is your problem. no one around stopped their harassment of her. these guys were supposed to be "anarchists," leftists, punk rockers, progressives, whatever. BULLSHIT.
i see this story as sort of symptomatic of sexism as a whole. although these guys were "joking," (you know, cause she must've been a humorless feminist, har har) their intoning this fucked up little fantasy, egging each other on, and falling in line makes them just like all the other shithole men who think they can objectify, abuse, use, degrade, and dehumanize women. as i said in the beginning of this entry, although sexist beliefs and behavior do not necessarily lead to violence, it is just this type of thinking that condones and begins to put into action that very violence of which women worldwide bear the brunt.
i work everyday to combat the sexist shit that i see. i cannot separate sexism and my existence. it is what i live in, what i see, what i hear, what i experience every fucking day. i don't ever get a break from it. i don't ever experience a day without it. i cannot just not think about it. it is there at every turn, at each moment, in a multiplicity of ways. often disguised and complex, called something different than it is, but always the same. and i am fucking privileged as shit. i fight the fight because i can, because there are women out there DYING and SUFFERING because they simply try to EXIST. so, if you're wondering why i'm such a fucking bitch, these are just a few of the reasons.