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Ms Wolf-
I recently ran across your article, Why is Rape Different?, in which you argue that allowing rape survivors to remain anonymous when we don’t do the same for any other crime victim infantilizes women and makes rape prosecutions more difficult. Although you wrote this some months ago, it’s still bouncing around on twitter, so I feel moved to respond.
You make the claim that:
It is wrong – and sexist – to treat female sex-crime accusers as if they were children, and it is wrong to try anyone, male or female, in the court of public opinion on the basis of anonymous accusations. Anonymity for rape accusers is long overdue for retirement.
So let me explain to you, Ms Wolf, why rape is
Continue reading An Open Letter to Naomi Wolf: Why Rape is Different
As you may have heard, SlutWalk started in response to a Toronto police officer saying that women should avoid dressing like sluts in order to avoid harassment or rape. And what was originally intended to be a local rally has inspired dozens of similar marches around the world.
The word “slut” has a rather difficult and complex history. Some folks embrace it and reclaim it, while others argue that there isn’t any way for women to reclaim a word that has been so loaded with sexist messages. There has also been some really great discussion about the different impact the word has on women of color and the different relationships they may have with both the term and the notion of reclaiming it.
I’ve
Continue reading Slut-Shaming Enables Rape
There’s a post on SexIs today from Roland Hulme, in which he shows that he almost gets how his privilege works. In his piece, he discusses the responses to a previous post of his, in which he wrote that (at the time), he was of the opinion that transgender people shouldn’t be able to change the designated sex on their birth certificates. And as he wrote:
It drew a lot of comments — many of them angry and frustrated — and opened my eyes to a lot of different perspectives on the issue. Ultimately, the debate revealed that something I thought was cut-and-dried turned out to be a lot more complex than I’d imagined. My opinion was challenged and my attitudes changed by the experience.
Continue reading When Straight, White, Cisgender Men Don’t Get It
Debates about sex work and trafficking aren’t new, but they sure are heating up these days. As someone who has known many different sex workers of all different genders and sexual orientations in pretty much every branch of the business, while also not having ever been a sex worker myself, I find that I have a rather unusual perspective, at least among the people engaged in this debate. And at the recent conference for the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, I heard about an enlightening way to think about sex-positivity that I think offers some clarity around this issue.
Breanne Fahs PhD from Arizona State University approaches sex-positivity from the understanding that true liberation requires both “freedom to” and “freedom from.” While
Continue reading A Sex-Positive Perspective on Sex Work
If you’ve been paying attention to the evolution of the current debates around sex work, you’ve probably noticed that more and more people are conflating sex work and trafficking. Of course, there have always been plenty of people willing to slut shame, attack, and blame women who have sex for money in order to try to control them. For some reason, these folks almost never talk about men and transgender sex workers, though. And as this article points out, “Legislation and social discussion have often blurred or denied any difference [between sex work and trafficking], but that has always made things worse rather than better for those involved.”
Just to be clear, I would LOVE to live in a world in which nobody was forced,
Continue reading Sex Work is to Trafficking as Sex is to Rape
It’s about time these folks got their act together. The Midland, Texas school board decided that their abstinence-only sexual propaganda program wasn’t working. Of course, there’s been plenty of research showing that, but what changed their minds was the 150 pregnancies among their students since the start of the school year in August. Since their school year began on August 23, that’s a pregnancy every 1.5 days.
The new plan is to shift to an abstinence-plus program called “It’s your game, keep it real.” The idea is to offer both abstinence and risk reduction information and while the Superintendent is reminding parents that information about abstinence isn’t going away, and that kids opt out if they or their parents want, lots of folks are skeptical.
Continue reading Finally! A Texas School Board Votes for Sex Education
You might already know this, but I like to geek out about language. In my experience and observation, our language both reflects and shapes how we think and feel. I also believe that we can only think clearly about something to the degree that we have a language for it. Plus, interpersonal friction often arises when we use words differently than other people, so developing a mutual language can help a lot. When it comes to sex and gender, I figure that anything that helps us think more clearly and communicate more gracefully is a good thing.
I recently found an amazing article by Dean Spade, called About Purportedly Gendered Body Parts that addresses some of the word choices that have been floating around lately.
Continue reading Gender, Bodies, and Language
This image from Post Secret is exactly why we need Planned Parenthood.
Over the last several months, Planned Parenthood has been under even more intense attack than usual. Despite the fact that abortion accounts for only 3% of their services (36% of their services were for contraception, 31% for STI screening and treatment, 17% for cancer screening and prevention), the anti-choice folks are using the fact that the organization provides abortions services to justify cutting federal funding. They’ve also been accusing the organization of racist bias with claims that PP targets African-Americans. Fortunately, their New York billboard making this claim was taken down. And they conveniently ignore the fact that PP’s Title X funding can not be used to pay for abortion
Continue reading We Need To Support Planned Parenthood
This post also appeared on the Good Vibrations Magazine.
It isn’t news that people who step outside the gender binary face violence, prejudice, and discrimination. But for the first time, there’s a large-scale study that researchers, policy makers, and equality advocates can point to for proof.
Injustice at Every Turn is an impressive accomplishment by the he National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF). The researchers surveyed 6540 transgender and gender non-conforming people in every US state, as well as the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands. It’s the largest study of its kind (the former record holder had 700 participants) so it offers a wider and more detailed view than ever
Continue reading New Research on Discrimination of Transgender & Genderqueer Folks
As a sex educator, I’ve been advocating for both risk reduction and harm reduction. In risk reduction, the goal is to lessen the chances that something unpleasant or dangerous might happen. When it comes to driving, for example, anti-lock brakes are risk reduction because they make it less likely that you’ll get into an accident. Condoms are also a form of risk reduction since they lower the odds of passing a sexually transmitted infection along.
By comparison, harm reduction is when you take steps to lessen the harm of whatever you’re going to do. Seatbelts reduce the harm of being in a car accident, for example. And getting regular STI tests makes it possible to get treatment sooner, which can reduce or avoid the harm
Continue reading The Pope’s “Sin Reduction” Model
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