Tag feminism

“Both Sides”

They aren’t the same but it still makes me nervous

When a conservative man who utterly snaps on women and he gets described as a “god-fearing preacher’s son” or “a good kid,” we all are angry and disgusted and don’t doubt the reality of the victims (plus this murder got to cover for his violent racism with “sex addiction,” which is a whole additional discussion).

But then when men (and people that engage in a similar problematic behaviors associated with that kind of social entitlement) on the left (or popular with the left) exhibit problematic behaviors ranging from casual sexism to outright assaults, they get to be “missing stairs” with people making excuses for their behavior or lack of meaningful improvement of their behavior because they’re vocal “allies” or “feminists”. They get to say the right words and skip doing the work and then they get a pass too on the minor stuff, or worse. And then people get to be surprised when the house of cards falls if they do something publicly bad enough.

I’m definitely having a lot of trouble processing this and other recent events and re-mapping that into my own experience; thst said, I’m sharing this as a concrete example and not as fishing for sympathy—I’ve gotten that already and I don’t need to rehash it. So: I told people about Jordan’s secret filming and my abuse and abuse of others at his hands, but people still loved going to his bar because it was popular, and he had the vocal “good person,” feminist public reputation—the Josses, the preacher’s sons. And it’s easier to dismiss intimate partners, because truly we can’t know what goes on behind closed doors. I get it; I struggle with it too. But right or left, a lot of the excuses we make for truly disturbing or problematic behavior are so similar.

Conflict is not abuse. People are allowed to make mistakes and learn from them, but people that have a base disrespect for The Other will feel more comfortable acting entitled (or worse) toward vulnerable populations.

And jesus FUCK this was so clearly a racially motivated hate crime. I’m not trying to make it only about the violent misogyny part because it’s so deeply used to amplify the vocal racism against AAPI people. I’m pissed off he gets to “have a bad day” and use “sex addiction” to cover for his hatred.

Also he “had a bad day”? The fucking victims had a bad day. That sheriff… the excuses are terrifying. I’m sure he’s a “good person” even though he posted racist memes about the “Chinese virus.” Is he just one bad day away from yelling a racial slur? Harassing Asian Americans? Abusing women? Murder? That man gets to have a gun.

Feminine Musicians, Guitarbois

Feminine Musicians, Guitarbois 

I have a friend that’s the frontwoman and composer of a metal band, Valentine Wolfe. She kicks ASS. The skills, the aesthetic, the soaring voice, the storytelling. Goth as hell, ethereal. Her duo partner and spouse taglines her as “half Veela, half Dementor.”

While watching them on stage, the masc-leaning person (another musician) next to me commented, “She’s too cute; she’s not spooky, she’s spoopy!”

And I kept thinking, Why? What do you mean by that? Is it her soft, lilting, feminine speaking voice? Her aesthetic of long hair and dresses? Why did he need to say that?

I wish I had pointed it out, but as another femme performer not wanting to rock the boat… I didn’t. Comments made by this person and other people about my own femininity as a performer made me second guess myself.

We get judged and dismissed for being too feminine, too cute, too sweet, even when we’re writing songs about death rot–even when “too feminine” isn’t, like, a thing. Who even gets to define that? To femme for what?

When I go to upload my music for distribution, the genre options are “singer songwriter” and “female singer songwriter.”

When I was first getting started, someone at a con came up to my now-husband, Richard, and asked, “She was great! Who writes her songs?”

He was sort of taken aback. “…She does.”

Listen, I use my femininity as part of my act. I will happily show as much cleavage as I legally can for adult shows and solicit tips. I understand there are pros and cons to that, but at the same time: I am my own product but I’m also more than my act.

I see it click when people start taking me seriously when we’re behind-the-scenes. That I’m more serious and thoughtful than my public persona. That I do a lot of work and consideration before I put myself out there, and that I’m always trying to learn more.

I feel like I have to better, more organized, more professional to be taken seriously because of the way I look; I mean, I’m literally a clown sometimes. And this is me as a white woman; women of color and gender non-conforming folks have tons of other bullshit on top of that.

At the same time, when I’m in “character,” I feel like my anger or activism gets treated as “safe,” or part of a bit. I can say the same thing off stage in the same tone and people find it much more confrontational (“confrontational” in that I’m speaking openly on a topic and not couching assertions). I guess part of it is that I’m much more open and authentic on stage and in my public voice than they realize; I’ve seen this play out in my private life too, when I talk openly about my feelings or health but I’m not taken at my word.

(An aside, but to be totally fair: I get it! I do do bits and joke and smile when I’m angry or have panic attacks that are mostly “freeze” or masked. I try really hard to take that into consideration when I’m communicating in my personal life, to varying degrees of success.)

Anyway, I was revisiting my thoughts on this because of the hot take going around that Taylor Swift is the Millennial Bruce Springsteen and I am on board. I don’t love-love Taylor Swift and she has the same kinds of White Feminism problems I do, but she’s still the dominant voice in her songwriting even when she’s collaborating. She describes what she sees.

Regardless of how you feel about Taylor Swift, it’s an interesting read comparing Baby Boomer and Millennial radio sensibilities and the way we treat men writing about women vs. women writing about men.

Taylor Swift is also an underrated guitarist.

At any rate, it’s a complicated topic and I’ve had experiences in my own life where my art was influenced by the men around me in negative ways. The topics of my songwriting, the kind of music I liked, the kind of “girly” guitar I played.

“Fuckboi” wasn’t a common term for me when I was in my 20s, but those kinds of negging dudes are “guitarbois.” Some of them don’t even play guitar! Or anything! But they have a lot of opinions on how I do music, and it’s distinctly different from offering constructive criticism or talking shop. They want to make sure they’re still higher in the pecking order.

I actually made a micro-game about it called “Punch a Guitarboi,” because externalizing my feelings is how I keep from obsessing. Also my sprite is cute!


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Ask Them Why

Ask Them Why

Icarus helped me write this

I think one of the most telling things about “anger” has been asking why I shouldn’t be angry, either literally in conversation or hypothetically when I’m in the shower thinking about all the conversations I’ll never have but coming up with fire responses anyway.  

It mostly boils down to two things:

1.) “You shouldn’t be angry at me” and 2.) “It doesn’t look good/like I think it should look.”

Neither address the truth or justification of my feelings, or even the lack thereof. It absolutely centers their feelings over my experience of myself regardless of the causes. And seriously–if I’m being a huge bitch or have something wrong, then I should be called out. It’s just that for me, their reasons for why I shouldn’t be angry drip pretty shallow and mostly revolve around their discomfort, or my unwillingness to center their comfort even when it’s not directed at them. 

On some level, I wonder if they’re hedging? That they’re more afraid of me now and want to make sure I’m not going to go after them. Any angry woman is threat, a possible “false accuser,” “crazy.”

Two friends–at least twice each–determined that because I directed anger toward them (regardless of their own gender) that I must be mad at “all men.” I feel like I’ve been caught in an intersection between the personal and cultural anxieties of a particular group of people who chose to deal with it by trying to control or dismiss me rather than consider having to face their own actions in the future, even as a hypothetical. 

The other issue here is how much “angrier” my neutrality is received, and that has a lot to do with the way I’ve been asked to reassure people that aren’t involved in the community case that I’m not angry at them, or I won’t “turn” on them, or that they’re “one of the good ones.” 

Even though I feel like what I’ve done to move my case forward–contacting the other women involved, going to the police–was right and actionable, evidenced truth, there are people that see me as more vindictive, more volatile, more of an unknown quantity no matter how transparent I’ve been. In some cases, it’s felt like they wanted more energy from me to reassure them that I don’t have it out for them or “all men”.

It made me think about how men/masc people have to put effort into remembering gender contexts, male privilege, that lots of people are afraid of male-bodied people because it’s #NotAllMen but #EnoughMen. And like, it’s not the same because there are other gender dynamics at play here but I’m not trying to be scary and I try to keep that context in mind. 

That said, I think some people have a skewed view of what “scary” from me and other people post #MeToo is right now, and want them to ask why.


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Getting Checked Over Eyelash Curlers

Getting Checked Over Eyelash Curlers

Me with a fancy eyelash curler

When I was in high school, one of the girls in school choir with me belonged to a fundamentalist- type evangelical church; I think it was a Pentecostal branch.

Anyway, she wasn’t allowed to wear pants—only long skirts—-and wasn’t allowed to cut her hair or wear makeup.

We were on a choir trip—I was maybe 15, 10th grade—and we were changing on the bus and getting ready.

At this point in my life, my personality was much the same as it is now except I had a bad case of “cool girl” and “one of the guys” and “not like other girls,” which is it’s own internalized misogyny for another time.

So we’re on the bus, getting ready, and I see this girl using an eyelash curler—just a curler, no mascara and no other makeup.

I don’t remember if I commented to another friend about it then or at a later time, but I remember scoffing at how “prissy” or “high maintenance” it seemed to use an eyelash curler, period. (I have come a long way in my cosmetic and feminist journey.)

My other friend looked at me and said flatly but not unkindly, “Madison, that’s all she can do.”

And then the context hit me. That was all show was allowed to do according to her religion to accent her eyes. She wasn’t allowed to wear makeup, so she found other ways to express that part of herself, whether it was intentional subversion or not.

I think about it, sometimes, in the way I use and think about makeup now. Other people have spoken more on this topic than me so I’ll be brief here, but I feel like there’s this perception that people are using makeup out of insecurity, and some definitely probably are sometimes–even me, when I’ve got eye bags from chronic fatigue.

But for a lot of people and for me, it’s a tool I can use to assert my space and influence how I am perceived by other people. Maybe that comes from an insecurity about exerting control over my environment, but I get a lot of joy out of choosing to look how I do.

There’s privilege with that, too. I have the money and time to do makeup, and a steady hand without disability. But I’m lucky. It makes me feel lucky, or pretty—even in my full-face clown greasepaint for Metricula—or just… fun. It makes me feel present because I had to look in the mirror and make choices.

All that said, I was humbled by my friend and I’m grateful for it. I also own two forty dollar eyelash curlers.


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We Aren’t Allowed to Scream

We Aren’t Allowed to Scream

Obviously I’ve been going through a lot lately, and doing a lot of thinking, therapy, and self-analysis.

The thing that continually has surprised me is some of the stuff “woke” men/masc/enbies have said to me about how I should act or feel while I’m in the middle of a legal case prosecuting my abuser. (For more on that, see here, here and here. It involves a nearly a score of women over a thirty year period, and my felony accusations are just a small part of that.)

I’ve been told I’m too angry, and that it’s setting a bad example; that I’m not using my platform the right way; that I should have gone to authorities sooner because “truth matters” even when you have to take a risk and it could have helped prevent other victims; that I shouldn’t call out allies for their behavior right now because it contributes to my struggle to maintain support networks; that I’m not sad/crying enough so I must be doing well with it; on and on.

It’s stifling. I’ve also noticed that a lot of men have been treating me differently since I came forward–more defensive. I feel like some men have messaged to offer me support, but then also wanted my acknowledgement? Approval? Something past, “Thank you, that means a lot to me.” They want me to reassure them they’re one of the good ones, one even going to the point of trying to justify a “grey area” sexual encounter as if I were an arbiter. If I haven’t gone out of my way to give them approval, I’ve occasionally been treated as somehow hostile to them or as if I’m withholding something they deserve because I’m stuck up. 

I like giving people validation and helping them feel good about themselves, but this constant call to center someone else’s feelings over my own is draining. Look, I have a lot going on, and I’m still able to fill that support role for some people, particularly those closest to me or the other survivors of Jordan that I’ve networked with. But past that, I can’t do all of that for other people at the same level as before. I’m trying to balance it.

As far as the criticism I’ve faced, I’m trying to sort what I think was valid and in good faith and what was not. Just because I’m in a prolonged crisis situation doesn’t mean that I’m immune from feedback, criticism, or being called out for inappropriate behavior. Some of what I’ve seen, though, is bad faith criticism or anger at me that I think comes from a place of insecurity. Some people are defensive around me, or projecting what I think is an unfair vengeance narrative on my actions. I am angry. That doesn’t make me vindictive.

I have a lot of trauma around being “exposed” or secretly observed/recorded, and honestly part of coping with the overwhelming stress and paranoia of that was trying to be as open-book as possible. If there is a problem with my thinking or perception, I want it to be easy to identify so I can address it or look at it from a different angle. An excerpt from the essay below was posted on Instagram by a Black woman activist about “call out culture” and it struck such a chord with me; this idea that just stating what happened to you is harm to the other person.

The idea that simply naming harm and/or violence is punitive, is frankly laughable. Very rarely are people accused of harm/violence punished for their actions.

It’s an idea that describing the hurt and fear someone may have caused you is aggressive in and of itself, and that you need to be “above it” or you’ve invalidated yourself or your story. There’s a difference between lying or twisting a truth and saying “this is what happened to me” when you feel unsafe or exploited and other avenues of stabilizing the situation (stabilizing, not necessarily resolving) have been rejected or aren’t accessible. I have done my best to be open, available, and clear and to admit my own mistakes or the validity of how someone may have interpreted my actions. 

It’s not enough to try and stay mindful and kind; I have to be perpetually calm, accepting, and measured to get taken seriously, to not be seen as hysterical or vengeful or man-hating.  

It’s like I can have a little anger, as a treat, but I’m not the one who gets to decide.

 

Takiyah Thompson (PettyPapi on Instagram) writes on RiotRevlot:

There is a hyperfocus on how victims and survivors choose to handle their abusers both within society as a whole, and within the movement. Should a survivor or victim publicly account the abuse or harm they experienced, the focus and scrutiny is instantly placed on the accuser.

We tell survivors to do everything besides confront and publicly account the abuse they’ve experienced. No community is exempt from espousing this victim blaming rhetoric. We say pray it away, talk it out in private, keep it in the family. Anything to spare abusers a fraction of the pain and trauma victims have known.

In the movement, the same victim blaming rhetoric is being repackaged as woke with the rejection of public accountings of harms being twisted into what is now pejoratively described as “call out culture.” What those who scrutinize survivors fail to realize is that public accountings of harm are usually the last ditch effort employed by survivors in an attempt to protect others and achieve consequences for their abusers.

Over the past month there have been a slew of survivors coming forward with their stories, calling out people who have been harmful or violent. While it may be easy to chalk the phenomenon up to feelings of hopelessness stemming from quarantine related restlessness, the situation deserves a more rigorous analysis.

At the time of this writing, 55 days have passed since George Floyd was murdered by pig cop Derek Chauvin. Protests and riots have rocked every corner of Turtle Island. Within a matter of days the Minneapolis 3rd precinct was burned to the ground. Cop cars were similarly torched In Atlanta, New York, Los Angeles, and Oakland. For the first time in recent memory, protests and memorials have been staged to honor black women and Trans people such as Breonna Taylor, Oluwatoyin Salau, Nina Pop, and Tony McDade.

In the past 55 days, the masses of marginalized people, particularly Black marginalized people have been injected with a demystifying dose of clarity, consciousness, and a renewed will to live and fight.

We have chosen this moment to speak our truth, not from a sense of suicidality or boredom. Rather, we are speaking our truth because there has never been a more materially opportune time to do so, because we are choking on the secrets we’ve kept in an attempt to protect our abusers from public scrutiny.

There is popular assumption that victims do not see the human complexity of our abusers. There is a burden placed on survivors to show kindness and grace toward their abusers. This burden we place on survivors ignores the fact that victims of abuse are usually the ones who have shown their abusers the most care and kindness, which was what put them in a position to be drawn in, manipulated, and ultimately abused.

Some have argued that publicly naming our abusers and the harm and/or violence we’ve endured is one sided, punitive, and carceral. That if we speak about the harm we’ve experienced, we are creating a one sided narrative. That when we talk about violence all too prevalent in the movement, we are the ones doing “state’s work.” Some have even likened call out posts to lynchings (try not to laugh!).

It’s interesting how this charge of “doing state’s work” is never leveled at the sexual abusers, antiBlack non-profit directors, or other wolves dressed up in revolutionary clothing, the people whose harmful and violent actions maintain the -isms we say we are committed to eliminating. Doesn’t the state smile to itself every time a strong and powerful comrade is pushed out of the movement because of racism, sexism, or any other oppressive violence?

The idea that simply naming harm and/or violence is punitive, is frankly laughable. Very rarely are people accused of harm/violence punished for their actions.

When someone is publicly accused of harm or violence the most common outcome is a mass unfollowing on social media. Let’s be clear, unfollowing someone is not a punishment. Choosing not to be friends with someone is not carceral. Deplatforming and distancing one’s self from someone accused of abuse is not “disappearing” someone. And above all, a call out post is decidedly NOT a lynching.

More often than not it is the accusers who are the ones punished. All too often, people who accuse the powerful and clouted are ostracized and ignored. Victims are labeled “drama” or worse, smeared as complete liars. Rumors begin circulating about the mental health status of victims and accusers.

When survivors go public with an accounting of harm and/or abuse, an overwhelming hush ensues. Something interesting recently happened to me. On Instagram, I addressed some of the harms and violences that myself, my family, and comrades had endured at the hands of local so-called community organizers. To my surprise, the post was shared dozens of times and yet only a fraction of that number contacted me to offer words of encouragement or support.

What this revealed to me is that we don’t have a callout culture at all, instead we have a whisper culture. A culture wherein accusations of harm and violence are shared privately and discussed in small cliques rather than brought into the open where contradictions can be resolved. In a whisper culture there is only rumored antiBlackness, rumored rape, rumored violence, rumored abuse, rumored evictions, and rumored misogynoir. In a whisper culture we talk about the accused and the accuser, but not to them. We piece together our own character assessments of each individual in an attempt to asses the plausibility of accusations.

It’s often assumed that call out posts “shame” those accused of being harmful and/or violent. This position is just that, an assumption. The reality however is that very rarely do individuals who have been called out display shame. More often than not, individuals accused of being harmful are still showing their faces at protests, still maintaining their internet presence, still raping people, still being antiBlack, still speaking on panels, still writing books, and still positioning themselves as authorities on truth and justice . To say call outs in themselves shame the accused is presumptuous at best and a straight up lie at worst.

What we are calling shame might in all reality be a cognitive dissonance response. What has been labeled as shame may actually be the discomfort of being confronted with the fact that ones actions have acted in accordance with all we wish to destroy.

Ultimately, a call out is no different than a scream. If someone is stabbed, they’ll likely scream. Pushed down a flight of stairs, scream. Shot, scream. If someone is harmed or violated in some way it is expected that they will vocalize that pain. Why then do we ask the authors of call out posts to keep their scream to themselves? Why do we tell them when, where, and how they are allowed to scream? This is not liberatory.

A scream does not have to be articulate. A scream does not have to sound good. A scream does not have to be quiet and considerate. Victims do not have to be held to a higher standard than the person who violated them. Victims do not have to be perfect.

Instead of whispering to one another about the uncomfortable dissonance of a survivor’s scream, our movement has to prioritize the violence and harm that initiates the scream. If all of our energy is focused on the tone a survivor takes, we will never be able to address the life and death matters that leave the most vulnerable lives hanging in the balance.


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Yes, I *am* angry

There are masculine people that use the language of self-care and social justice to absolve themselves of ever having to experience criticism and then will attempt to dismiss anyone holding them even mildly accountable as a hysterical woman. 

They maintain a public shield.

The reason they lash out at people in private instead is because if they did it in public, they might open themselves to critique if more than “their” side is available in public discourse. They will say it’s to avoid airing “dirty laundry,” or to protect *you* from criticism. 

“I’m doing this to protect you, it’s for your own good, that’s why I’m agreeing with you publicly but behind closed doors I’m going to use my knowledge of what you’re going through against you and remove the avenues for you to speak up personally and professionally because I’ve been monitoring it.This is so sad, look what you’ve done to yourself.” 

So I get to be one more girl afraid of a volatile masc person in her organizations, and any defense I take to protect myself or others will feed into the “angry hysteria” and “crazy ex girlfriend” narrative. 

I’m not entitled to discussions, or explanations, or apologies, but neither are they free from my criticism and disappointment in their cruelty. Their carefully constructed dismissals and anger illustrate that my fear of retaliation from them isn’t paranoia.  


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