I can see it now: "I'm sorry, Miss Hotness, but I have to fire you. Your overwhelming power over my penis is distracting in the office and you only have yourself to blame. I have to fire you."
Or, "The Court finds for Mr. NoControl because he was obviously led on to brutally torture, rape, and dismember the 'victim' due to her massive Wombyn's Powah (sic) forcing him to do it. Why the 'victim' would so hopelessly violate Mr. NoControl's physical and psychic rights by overpowering his natural, masculine common sense and DEMAND he commit these acts is unconscionable and it is suggested that Counsil now returns to the legally responsible parties who represent the 'victim' to demand restitution and a large financial award for Mr. NoControl's current mental anguish..."
Yeah, I usually like David Wong's articles a lot, but that one rather angered me. The other implication that annoys the living Hell out of me is that it is impossible for anyone to have any motivation to accomplish anything culturally significant besides sex with women. So. Straight girls not only never have done anything, but have never wanted to? I don't even remember whether male homosexuality was addressed, but I guess gay men never do anything either? And for me specifically, the allegation that the only reason any musician ever makes music is to Get Girls (TM) is really really irritating. *I* make music. I can assure you it's not for the hot barely-legal groupies. There is an element, yes, of wanting to impress people. But, um, not to get into their pants. And if I *were* trying to get into people's pants, it wouldn't be girls. No offense, ladies, but I'm afraid I'm hopelessly heterosexual. You may all breathe a sigh of relief now
( ... )
There's always a certain amount of lad-magness on Cracked, but they usually do better. The first half of the article or so was pretty decent, but then he went way off the rails. It was the sort of thing I'd expect to see written by a 22-year-old college boy.
Yes, it was kind of a depressing return to form. I used to like Cracked, but be unable to read much of it at a time because the overwhelmingly male-centered viewpoint would get on my nerves. But they'd gotten so much *better* lately. I've really enjoyed being able to read their articles without having to make so damned many allowances. I hope this was an aberration.
what I found most interesting about that article was the confirmation that men think women are AWARE of that power over them, when no. No, mostly they don't.
Mostly we are still caught up in a view of ourselves from being called fat by the whole male side of the soccer team at 8, or whatever particular incident cements our self-image. And there may be a couple of moments in our lives we got guys to do stuff by acting like a girl, but I think most normal girls are kind of shocked when it works.
Could be wrong.
Elizabeth Bear posted a kind of awesome rant on women's self-esteem which only relates to this in my own head but I think it may be of interest to you, if you haven't already come across it: http://matociquala.livejournal.com/2127326.html
Oh, wow! I hadn't caught that! That is excellent. I love "scab-picking hairshirt self-abnegation." That made me laugh, even though the piece really isn't funny.
There's also the issue that when guys do something because hey, you're a hot girl, there's this gross overtone of ". . . and now you OWE ME" that is completely off-putting and, frankly, it's not just gross, it's scary. It can be very scary. It only feeds that sense of entitlement that some jerks have, and it's completely involuntary on your part.
Elizabeth Bear is awesome, because she'll use a great turn of phrase even if it's comic and the piece is serious. True of her fiction AND her blogging...
I'm not sure, but I think because I'm redheaded and curvy I get treated by strangers like a woman not to be trusted. Which is...ridiculous.
I wish I remember where I saw this particular article talking about a (college?) classroom where the instructor asked how the students prevented rape. The men didn't, and I think the person recounting was one of the males in the class, or hearing it from him--he was shocked at the fact that all the girls had thought it out. And found out that his sister, his mom did, too. It's not that this particular guy was misogynist, he just had never been told what it's like.
(After reading the Cracked article this post is discussing I followed the link to "The Wrong Questions Guys Ask" article. Which. Was brilliant, so true and funny. Have you read it?)
I remember reading that classroom/rape prevention story. There's that one going around now about the teacher pointing out that how the male student felt after being hit on by a guy was the same gross and creepy unwanted attention thing that women have to deal with all the time, and I thought that was brilliant, too.
Absolutely brilliant and spot-on! I will share this, too, but will try to do so when my Friends list is at peak reading times. Which is not now, because I'm up late, procrastinating between packing boxes and going to bed. Also on new antidepressants. Yay, happy head-juice times!
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I can see it now: "I'm sorry, Miss Hotness, but I have to fire you. Your overwhelming power over my penis is distracting in the office and you only have yourself to blame. I have to fire you."
Or, "The Court finds for Mr. NoControl because he was obviously led on to brutally torture, rape, and dismember the 'victim' due to her massive Wombyn's Powah (sic) forcing him to do it. Why the 'victim' would so hopelessly violate Mr. NoControl's physical and psychic rights by overpowering his natural, masculine common sense and DEMAND he commit these acts is unconscionable and it is suggested that Counsil now returns to the legally responsible parties who represent the 'victim' to demand restitution and a large financial award for Mr. NoControl's current mental anguish..."
Sheesh.
Grey
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Mostly we are still caught up in a view of ourselves from being called fat by the whole male side of the soccer team at 8, or whatever particular incident cements our self-image. And there may be a couple of moments in our lives we got guys to do stuff by acting like a girl, but I think most normal girls are kind of shocked when it works.
Could be wrong.
Elizabeth Bear posted a kind of awesome rant on women's self-esteem which only relates to this in my own head but I think it may be of interest to you, if you haven't already come across it: http://matociquala.livejournal.com/2127326.html
Reply
There's also the issue that when guys do something because hey, you're a hot girl, there's this gross overtone of ". . . and now you OWE ME" that is completely off-putting and, frankly, it's not just gross, it's scary. It can be very scary. It only feeds that sense of entitlement that some jerks have, and it's completely involuntary on your part.
Reply
I'm not sure, but I think because I'm redheaded and curvy I get treated by strangers like a woman not to be trusted. Which is...ridiculous.
I wish I remember where I saw this particular article talking about a (college?) classroom where the instructor asked how the students prevented rape. The men didn't, and I think the person recounting was one of the males in the class, or hearing it from him--he was shocked at the fact that all the girls had thought it out. And found out that his sister, his mom did, too. It's not that this particular guy was misogynist, he just had never been told what it's like.
(After reading the Cracked article this post is discussing I followed the link to "The Wrong Questions Guys Ask" article. Which. Was brilliant, so true and funny. Have you read it?)
Reply
I remember reading that classroom/rape prevention story. There's that one going around now about the teacher pointing out that how the male student felt after being hit on by a guy was the same gross and creepy unwanted attention thing that women have to deal with all the time, and I thought that was brilliant, too.
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