The necessary unpacking of slut shaming

During the recent and highly contentious exchange between Miley Cyrus and Sinead O'Connor I had the opportunity to have lots of interesting and valuable discussions surrounding appropriation, objectification, and sexual expression. Through these discussions I was able to codify my political stance when it comes to slut shaming.

By far the most simple & frequent critique of Sinead's letter was that she was engaging in slut shaming. I understand where the need for this critique comes. It is important but I chose not to write about the slut shaming aspects of the letter in my post and instead made notes about my resistance to use the term.

Slowly I came to realize that my resistance came from a feeling of incompleteness and that it wasn't just this instance of internet people shouting "slut shaming!" that felt incomplete.

I shy away from the using the term "slut shaming" not because I don't recognize and want others to see the sexist behavior it identifies but because I believe the term itself can and has in some instances become a catch-all for very general array of the sex-related oppression women face. In radical contexts catch-alls can easily become problematic excuses to stop defining and going into the complex detail for that oppression. A catch-all runs the risk of overgeneralizing things that are complex and need complex definitions.

In the example I cite in a previous post a friend was asked by "concerned" parents to cover up her "dangerous" breasts so the group of young girls she was traveling with would be "safe" from lusty European men.

We agree that this behavior is both ridiculous and disgusting. We discussed this a potential slut shaming.

Slut shaming as defined by wikipedia is: "the act of making any person feel guilty or inferior for certain sexual behaviors or desires that deviate from traditional or orthodox gender expectations."

Based on her account and this definition I don't think it was. Or at least not just that. To me it was straight up sexual harassment and body policing at the hands of trusted authority figures. In fact they way she was dressing had little-nothing to do with her expressing her sexuality. It was the parents that assumed her clothing choices were "sexual", so how could it have been slut shaming?

When slut shaming is identified those doing the identifying run the risk of making the mistaken assumption that the subject of the bullying/harassment/shaming is indeed expressing their sexuality. Regardless of what they are wearing we can't know for certain that someone is expressing their sexuality unless they tell us explicitly.

The language of slut shaming is especially problematic in light of recent efforts of some groups to reclaim the word "slut" as an identity.

When "slut" becomes an identity (as some are struggling for it to become through its reclamation) it separates women into categories of sluts/nonsluts. This distinction divides feminists communities and does nothing beyond support individual declarations of identities (which should not be the primary/only function of feminism). 

Instead of dividing women based on sexual identities let's acknowledge that we are all humans and we all experience desire. Do we really need a label that denotes that some of us are willing to express the sexual ones?

When slut becomes an identity the harassment/shaming that is related to the expression of sexuality become about identity. The body/behavior policing, the sexual harassment and the gross slew of things referred to as slut shaming isn't about the identities of those targeted (beyond the fact that they are women). It's about their behaviors and expressions.

Slut shaming is not about "you are wrong" but are about "you are doing it wrong". And by "it" I mean womanhood. Slut shaming is about tacitly enforcing the misogynist rules of womanhood. If we want to be radical (get at the root of things) we need to dig in and figure out what specifically is being denied and why. We can't just be satisfied by just calling oppressive behavior "slut shaming" because it's not just about the (slut/nonslut) identity of the person being shamed, it's also about how that shaming fits into the broader context of oppression.

It's not enough to see the objectifying oppression of a woman and call it "slut shaming". It's a great first step, but it is just a start. In order to combat the complex nature of sexist oppression
we need to continue making space in our politics for corresponding complexity.

How to not catcall

So, it's high summer in Seattle again. And same as happens every summer, Seattlites are crawling out in droves. Sunny sidewalks and fair-weather festivals are awash with fancifully dressed humans soaking up their much needed vitamin D. Among the bustle of ice cream trucks, casual conversations are sprouting like wildfire. Sun-drunk, strangers are talking to strangers.

As awesome as summer is, not every encounter with a stranger is sunny. Sometimes it's downright unpleasant. Because catcalls.

There's many types of catcalls but the one thing they all share is their demand for the attention/response of another rather than laying ground for honest equitable conversation. Catcallers seek to illicit a reaction/response to justify the harasser's sense of importance. When people say “insecurity is a turn off” this is what they mean. Using the attentions/reactions of others to justify your own importance is creepy and disrespectful. Don't do it!

The difference between a catcall and a friendly respectful approach is more than semantic (although paying attention to content doesn't hurt). The words used to approach someone are often less important than the intuitively communicated expectations behind them.

Example 1: Just yesterday a man passing me on the sidewalk said “I'm sorry if I'm bothering you but you are a very beautiful woman.” While it might sounds like it was the “I'm sorry if I'm bothering you” that made his approach unthreatening (I've had harassers fake apologize for bothering me very often), my ease at his approach had more to do with his posture and tone of voice. He shrank his body down some, pulled his arms back and shoulders up, and maintained as wide a distance between us as the sidewalk would allow. His voice, while not a whisper, was at a volume only I could hear. Because of these and other more subtle factors of gesture and expression it became clear to me that he expected no reaction or engagement from me.

The message I got from his approach went something like this in my head: “If you have the want/energy to listen to me I'd like to share my attention/words/presence with you.”

And I actually did have some energy (but not a lot of time) to share with him. I told him I liked his t-shirt and we both continued walking in our respective directions.

Example 2: Just days before on the very same street as the previous example another man passing me on the sidewalk approached me with very similar content: “Hey, you look real nice.” But the difference between his tone and posture and those used by the man in the previous example spoke volumes. His voice was loud and his tone what I assumed to be suggestive. He looked directly at my eyes all the while I was in his visual range (hoping to force eye contact). As I passed he also leaned close and thrust his hand into my path (I assume for a handshake).

I walked around his hand and did not respond to his comment, gesture, or attempt at eye contact. As I walked on he shouted after me “What, you can't say hello!?”

The message I got from his approach: “I want your attention. Gimme. You're a jerk if you don't.”

The person in this example felt expectant and I assume even entitled to my attention based on what he shouted after me. He resented me for rejecting his approach, further confirming my read of his body language, expression, and his volume and tone of voice. And for a the few moments we continued to share the block I felt grateful to be outdoors and heading in the opposite direction of this person (folks who consider/attempt approaching strangers in captive environments like elevators or buses TAKE NOTE! The thing I felt grateful for was that I could physically get away from this person if he decided to continue seeking my attention).

On some level the approacher in the second example was gaming me for me attention. And I don't play power games with people I don't know.

The crucial difference between these two approaches is that the first approacher, clearly expressed his concern for where my boundaries and potential to interact with him might be through his body language and voice. He approached me with no expressed expectation that he would receive any attention or recognition in return for his offering of attention.

All of this is subtle and nonverbal, but it is not out of bounds for anyone who has practice using social cues to communicate with other humans.

If you're like me you're probably thinking “Okay I see how those two approaches are different but how do I DO that respectful approach thing?”

Much as I'd love to offer an actionable list, I have no specific advice about what words or gestures to use. Every person comes with their own history of experiences and every situation comes with it's own unique context.

In her comic strip Girls With Slingshots Danielle Corsetto offers a pretty solid starting point:



But I'd like to flesh out the why and how of this strategy a little bit more.

As I've explored in previous writings, nobody is entitled to the listening of another person. While I believe this to be personally true (nobody is entitled to my listening) there are many ways we social animals feel pressured or obligated to give others our listening and attention. Human beings compulsions to listen to one another can be an incredibly useful and powerful force. It's how we build, trust, relationships, and collaborative communities. But it is also a force that catcallers, trolls, & hecklers know well and love to exploit by relying on the feeling of obligation to listen/respond to those they approach.

Wanna know how to avoid triggering any feelings of obligation surrounding listening a stranger might have before you approach?

First check your wants. What do you want from this person? Attention? Attraction? Makeouts? To trade outfits? Whatever it is that's cool. Now, hear this: They don't owe you any of that. Recognize those wants. They are a legit part of who you are. File them away as potential points of interaction for later, if and only if this approach gives rise to future interactions wherein this person might want to know you and your wants better.

And finally when you approach a stranger for conversation, approach that interaction with no other expectation than to offer that other person your attention and presence.

Sounds simple right?

But in my experience this approach is scarier and more vulnerable than using any line, joke, or any other shitty social norms for getting attention.

Offering your attention/presence openly and without expectation of reciprocity or recognition is brave and raw and it's exactly what I picture whenever someone talks about “putting yourself out there.”

So yeah, it's hard. But it gets smoother with practice and after a while you may even start to feel proud of being brave enough to “put yourself out there” regardless of whether those you're approaching decide to respond to or recognize your approach.

In the event of a less than ideal response or lack of response from someone you approach try to remember that a stranger's response or lack thereof to your approach probably has little to do with you, the content, or even style of your approach. Their experience and learned contexts (which dictates what they assume about their location, and you, and you words) are going to ring much louder to them than whatever you have to say and however you have to say it. 

It's okay to be confused about why you didn't get a response. But confusion is a normal part of social life and you have to accept that a stranger's experience is something you just can't know without them letting you in. A person who doesn't know you has absolutely no obligation to give you specific feedback on what about your approach (content, style, context) didn't appeal to them. If you're concerned about or want to refine your skills for approaching strangers ask your friends or a counselor/therapist for feedback, not a stranger. 

Many people choose to ignore all strangers who approach them because of repeated instances of harassment. Someone not responding to a stranger's approach does not always mean they assume said stranger is going to harass them.

Example 3: Last week I was worried, running late and without coffee to an early doctor's appointment I was mentally prepping myself for (I hate the going to the doctor). A man passed me and said “I really like your style.” Even though I was unthreatened by the words, body language, and tone of his approach I said nothing and continued on because I did not have energy to open a conversation or even to thank him for the compliment I richly enjoyed.

Final notes and a privilege check: There are many complicated often prejudicial factors that lead folks to engage or decide not to engage with strangers. I recognize these complications but chose not to address them in this piece. If you wanna discuss that with me the comments are a great place! The examples I cite above are by no means completely representative of my interactions with strangers. While it's certainly not the only thing affecting my interactions, I recognize that in my interactions (with strangers or not) I receive some amount of privilege based on how my appearance matches that of current beauty standards. Also I live in a pretty awesome and friendly neighborhood!

A Shift in Focus: Why I've Chosen to Say "Consent-Positive" Rather Than "Sex-Positive"

This decision's been building for a long time. It's by no means final, absolute, or certain, only that it makes space for my own uncertainty (and hopefully the uncertainty and hesitation of others but more on that later). Like many things concerning love and relationships and sex, this decision and the conversations I've had surrounding it have resisted simplicity and can only be expressed in the messy progression that follows.

I'll start with my own experience. In the past when using the term “sex-positive” I, like many of my women friends, have had listeners assume that by saying I'm sex-positive I'm saying I’ll be into whatever kind of sex they’re into. And also that I am willing to do that kind of sex with them soon or immediately. "Sex-positive" is optimistically coded as consent, potential consent or some indication of how/what I will consent to. I can’t say I've had a full frontal "Hey! but I thought you were sex-positive" when I've refused such sexual advances but I have been coerced and "c'mon”d. On two separate occasions, other “sex-positive” (male) party goers suggested that because of my nudity at past events and my self-professed sex-positivity I should disrobe and “continue the tradition”. I first started to say “consent-positive” in an attempt to duck the possibility of the creepy interactions "sex-positive" had elicited.

It's not just self defense, but it was because of this and other like experiences that I slowly began to realize more reasons for this shift. I began to notice that whenever I talked about being kinky, poly, and/or sex-positive what I ended up talking about was consent. As much as I do enjoy talking about sex it felt much safer personally and more transgressive politically to talk about how powerful an experience I've found it to build language and rituals that ensure that my consent, and the consent of those I am sharing space with is consistently receiving attention. (Note I don't say that consent itself be constant or even consistent).

One of the main reasons I continue wanting to wrench focus onto consent rather than the sex is that when sex is the rhetorical focus of a conversation or the goal of a movement consent starts to look like a means (getting to yes) to an end (sex). Some of you may recognize this progression model as it is commonly identified in feminist circles as a way in which men are taught to and often do relate to women and women's sexualities. It's the same logic that tells folks that the ideal romantic evening involves a man romancing (the consent out of) the woman and him fucking her until he (or they both) comes. In this narrative sex is the happy ending and consent is the means. I want consent to be both the means and the end! I want consent without sex to be viewed as it's own happy ending.

I (optimistically) don't think sex-positive activists intentionally engage in or encourage a view of consent as a means to sex, but making sex the first and most visibly important part of our politics often activates this taught progression in the minds of those who hear sex-positive messages.

The shift in focus I am seeking is from sex to communication as a whole. This shift is not meant to slight or shame sex or even say that sex in an unimportant form of communication. I want to get clear on the fact that consent can and often is about more than just about sex. Making this shift in focus means that when we talk about consent as a whole what we're talking about is the practice of making our communications less violent towards the wants and bodies of other human beings. We don't have to just be talking about sex when we talk about consent.

Contrary to popular belief, consent exists to be more than just “sexy” (and yes, it can be very sexy). It exists so that we as humans can reduce the harm we do to one another in our interactions.
To me consent is more important and further reaching than sex, but wildly less visible and less trendy (more on this later). I have heard too many sex-positive activists talk about sex either without mentioning consent directly or merely tacking it on as a simplified footnote.

At the behest of her commenters popular sex-positive video blogger Laci Green recently made a video about anal play. Now to be clear I am overjoyed that people are getting more accurate and useful information on engaging more safely/comfortably in the kinds of sex/play they are interested in. But after watching her video on anal play I got the nagging feeling that something was lacking.
Before I could identify exactly why when radicalfeministquotes.tumblr.com beat me to it:

This is one of the big problems with sex-positivity. Laci Green says she received an “alarming amount of messages about people being pressured into anal sex”. I think we all know that by “people”, she means women (or at least people with male partners). Her solution is to make a video giving advice on how to have anal sex. How does that help those women? Her advice to commenters: “Just don’t do it if you don’t want to”. No shit, Laci, I’m sure that idea had already occurred to those women. It’s easy to tell women to just not do things they’re not comfortable with, but that doesn’t do anything about the GUYS PRESSURING THEM TO DO THOSE THINGS. They’re still in the same boat they were before, trying to figure out what to do with a guy who wants to fuck her butt in a world that says women will die alone if they don’t let guys fuck their butts. There’s not a moment in this video where she is reprimanding these guys or telling em’ to knock it off, because OMG THAT MIGHT HURT THEIR FEELINGS AND MAKE THEM FEEL ASHAMED OF THEIR SEXUAL DESIRES."

By keeping the conversation focused solely on sex and how to do it Laci dodges an important distinction. While having desires is totally valid, the ways we express them should not come from a place of expectation that those desires be met. For me the missing piece in Laci's video is her telling folks that want anal play that sometimes you can't always get what you want, nor should you expect to or continue asking after being served explicit refusal(s).

Refusing to give consent should never be framed as negative or any less exciting or valid a choice than choosing to give consent for sex acts. And while I’ll admit to rarely experiencing outright exclusion (entitled vibes notwithstanding) at refusing sex in a sex-positive community there is a disproportionate amount of praise for those who consent to participate and support sex/play in sex-positive communities. Saying “yes” is framed as empowering and to give one’s consent is “sexy”. Which can and often does imply that a “no” or hesitation is a problem or “less cool/liberated”. Hesitation and refusal are totally valid expressions of uncertainty and deserve respect. The framing of "consent is sexy" can, in some applications, invalidate this vital uncertainty.

This pressure and implied coolness/liberation of "yes" is similar to a popular consumer culture's advertising strategy in which the consumer is presented the “empowering” choice between an array of products. The choice to purchase one (the best) of these products is framed as so powerful that the option to choose no product is implicitly framed as less powerful or even erased all together.

Many sex-positive folks I've met are well versed in active consent practices which is awesome, but what is often forgotten is that this specialized education in consent is not a uniform privilege that not everyone has access to. In some ways the BDSM community provides an example of this privilege. It has lots of explicit tools and language for focusing on consent (not that this makes BDSM spaces inherently consent-positive spaces). The problem is that some kinky and sex-positive folks sometimes forget that not everyone they will interact with will have as well studied or uniform understanding of consent as they do. For example, saying “you can say 'no' at any time” is vastly different from actually negotiating trust with a partner to ensure that they will say "no" when/if they feel the need/want to.

For me even, after learning, writing, and studying about it, consent feels intuitive, hard to translate, and hard to talk about. But talking about consent is a must. Especially in poor communities, communities of color, non-english speaking contexts, and other marginalized communities, whose models for consent are often invalidated or overwritten altogether by priviledged sex-positive educators and activists. So yes, sex-positive activists and BDSMers have a lot of tools for consent but these tools aren’t useful or applicable for every context.

But worse than these decontextualized potentially erasing approaches to consent, the “racier” parts of sex-positivity and BDSM are now gaining pop culture currency with the distinct absence of consensual tools and practices. Important nuances are often left out in favor of what's blindly edgy and controversial. You need only to glance at 50 Shades of Grey and it's popularity for an example of important nuances being left out. The sex and powerplay of BSDM are becoming trendy but the consent parts, not so much.

Ad culture is right. "Sex sells". But when ad culture (and many people) say "sex" what usually comes to mind is the kind of sex had by heterosexual, white (or nonwhite and exotified), young, able-bodied, gender conforming, conventionally attractive people (with the assistance of the right products). Because of this prevalent and incomplete understanding of sex, the parts of the sex-positive movement that have caught on the strongest are those which feature these kinds of sex. Whether sex-positivists intend support it or not this specific and inaccurate cultural definition of sex (which leaves out both consent & the sexual experiences of so many) is what gets applied to sex positivity by the wider media. As with all things scooped up by the mainstream it's losing it's nuance. Unfortunately losing that nuance includes losing importantly intersectional conversations about sexual diversity and consent.

Recognizing and building sustainable consent and sex practices is especially crucial in sex-positivity's intersection with sexual violence. In the Ethical Slut, Dossie Eaton and Janet Hardy famously say that “sex is nice and pleasure is good for you”. This is true for many but incomplete and perhaps dangerously so. Swathes of broader culture and the medical & legal communities consider rape and other traumatic and/or nonconsensual sexual acts to be sex. This is especially true of rapes and assaults that go unreported and unrecognized. One of my worst fears around casually saying saying “I'm sex-positive” is that those survivors of unidentified/unreported rapes/assaults will hear me and get the impression that I am trying to encourage them to view their traumatic experiences positively. Or that I am implicitly endorsing the actions of rapists/assaulters. I do not ever want to suggest, even implicitly, that I feel any sort of positivity about rape or sexual assault.

I do honestly believe consent is the foundation for good sex, but also to a less harmful way of interacting with other people. Consent education can start as soon as kids start to realize that their bodies are in fact separate from the bodies of others. Imagine how much easier it would be to confront the harassment and assaults of bullying if youths understood how to articulate their boundaries. This reasoning is the least formulated of all because it requires a radical shift in how we relate to children and how we relate to each other. And quite honestly I believe it’s more radical than many of the co-opted and often limiting goals of sex-positive revolution.

I'm not saying the fight for sexual liberation is over (far from it!), but I am saying sex-positivity, like any kind of effective activism, needs to brach out and realize how it connects and intersects with other radical movements and ideals. I see consent-positivity as a start to that. If sex-positivity is all about bring joy and sustainable, harm-reducing practices into the sexual interactions, then consent-positivity is about bring joy and sustainable, harm-reducing practices into all interaction humans share with one another. Let's work together.

Dear Dad*

*I just sent this letter to my dad over facebook after he commented on a picture of my new hair with the words "Too short!"

Hey, I didn't like this comment. I'd like for us to talk about this in person in the near future, but because this is the second time I've felt the need to delete your comments I wanted to let you know why.

I do not appreciate the majority of your comments about my appearance. Especially when your words encourage me to appear "prettier" or more "girly/womanly". I've decided to look the way I look because it feels right to me. I like my hair short. I like my armpits & legs hairy and my belly and thighs a little fatty!

I love these things about myself and would appreciate it if you would comment no further on the choices I make about my own physical appearance. In other words: 

Unless I ask you directly (even if I am asking all of my internet community) I am not soliciting your opinion of my appearance.

When you tell me that I should have longer hair or that I should lose weight I feel afraid that you want me to feel ashamed of or doubt the choices I make in about to my own body. This fear is out of sync with the person I know you to be. You are and have been an incredible father and parent to me. I feel mind-bogglingly lucky to have you in my life. Truly, I love you more than I can say.

I am asking this of you because I trust in the person that you are and I believe in the relationship we share as as adults and friends. As my father & friend, I know that you don't want to hurt my feelings or pressure me to do something that doesn't feel right to me, because I know that you love me (this is never in doubt) and that you want me to love myself (this is the part I am afraid about).

The ways I've chosen to appear and how I treat my own body are the best way I know to love and express myself. It saddens me to think that you dislike the ways I am finding to love myself and my body. But I can live with the dislike. (people who love each other often do things that the other dislikes!) What hurts the most is being asked, cajoled, & hinted to about how I should change or stop doing things that clearly make me happy because of that dislike. 

If you dislike my hair that much then don't look at it. Stop telling me to grow it out. I love you the way you are. It doesn't mean I have to like everything about you. I request the same courtesy from you.

I know that you and I have differing opinions about fashion & appearance. But these are differences of aesthetic opinion. And I would love to discuss these differences with you more in depth when I see you at Christmas. But for now, can we keep our conversations about fashion and appearance general/philosophical & not about me in particular?

Thank you so much for being my Dad! There is no thanks that could be enough for that! I love you so much and can't wait to see you over the holidays. Give my love to Mom!

BIG HUGS! 

Wendy R.M.

This was difficult to write. But important. So glad I did.

Nobody is entitled to your listening

Last month I had a friend look me dead in the face while talking about some pretty triggering shit, thank me, and then say "You know Wendy, you're the person who taught me to listen." My eyeballs blurred salty with  surprising joy. This was one of the best compliments I've ever received. And it's taken me a month to dig out why.

I haven't always been as good a listener as I am today. I work at it and on it. Daily. For four years I've been trying to find/create kind, consent-respecting, and genuine ways to demonstrate my appreciation and excitement in discussion with others. I have tried countless practices and approaches. I am pretty constantly aware of and seeking to make the ways I interact with others better for me and better for them. I always want my communication styles to be more sustainable, alive, and respectful. 

For a long time I didn't know what to call this work. This work is not something that has a name or is given much air time in a culture that privileges extroversion and aggression in our interactions (thanks to capitalism & other broken hierarchies). Because I had no name for it I didn't know how valuable this work was. It's taken several friends calling it out to me in various ways for me to see that the way I listen and interact with others is incredibly valuable, highly energetic, and deeply aware.

"My voice matters." This has been a mantra for the last five years. And, yes, of course it fucking does, but my listening matters too. And what's more it matters in the same way. It matters because it is a part of who I am. It's also a force/tool with which I can have an impact (hopefully positive) on my culture and surroundings.

Listening can be just as powerful a force as speaking and storytelling. I know this to be true because my experience in bearing witness to the struggles and trauma of others has taught me that in those instances listening is better than speaking. Always. To give up the space in your experience for the voice and speech of another person is mindbogglingly moving and important. Last weekend I was privileged to be part of an audience that was acknowledged for our role in "holding open the space for the truths of the performers."

In and out of the theater, when interacting with others how we choose to listen matters. This is extremely true in dating contexts. I can definitely say that I've decided to not to go on a second date with someone, not because of the way they talked but, because of the way they listened or didn't listen.

Listening is as powerful & valuable & often just as tiring as speech. 

I work in customer service. I recognize that part of my work there is to be ready to listen with customers. To be present with them and engage in their stories and words. For the most part I like this about my job. But, like many other folks in customer service, there are those moments when a customer talks to you in a way or with words that are unpleasant. Were you not working you would leave the space or confront this person's speech, but since you are at work, you do the listening.

There are limits and boundaries to this of course, but enduring such assaults on my boundaries for listening is what I recognize as part and parcel of a customer service job. Listening is the primary job of a customer service professional. I am paid to listen to customers, which can be tiring. Sometimes when I get home I don't want to interact with anybody at all for a full hour. If someone talks to me on the bus ride home I ignore them and point to my huge "I'm-clearly-not-listening-to-you" headphones

Thing is, unless I am being paid for it, (&man are there limits and problematic capitalist hierarchies to that!) I've realized that nobody is entitled to my listening. It is a gift. A tool I have crafted and honed and nobody has a right to participate in my attention it unless I say so.

This is the reason I find sidewalk fundraising to be infuriating and in some ways harassment (also that they tell me I have a kind smile, use words like "lady" and "ma'am" and say "hey gorgeous" to get me to talk to them).

I want to find better ways to protect my listening, because sometimes I am too tired to fight and too tired to say fuck off and just want to get away.

In a lot of ways this plays out in in the form of street harassment folks (women in depressing majority) deal with on an infuriatingly regular basis. It's not just that catcalls or comments about our bodies are offensive, sexist, and objectifying in ways we don't consent to, it's also that whoever is making a catcall thinks that they are entitled to the listening/attention of whoever they are harassing. Forcing, shaming, or bullying someone into giving you their attention is just as harmful and violent a transgression as silencing their voice or censoring their words.

It's important to recognize that this is not just an adult problem. Kids, teens, and young adults are the victims of "you have to listen to me" bullying at the hands of peers and most often from adults. This helps normalize forced listening and fosters the notion that there are some people (those who have more power than us) we should always listen to (regardless of our ability/will).

Internet trolls make endless use of this learned "obligation" to interact/listen. It's the cornerstone of what makes their harassment so effective. It's why we hesitate to delete their comments and why they're most proudest of their forced visibility. On some level trolls operate based on a value system where the attention & listening of others is a commodity to be stolen, bought with tactics & tricks and then gloated over like a pile of gold coins.

It's a devastatingly effective hack of our learned social etiquette which tells us censorship is a sin far graver than harassment. Trolls love to tout censorship in defense of their comments/actions which have already killed and possibility of consensual, collaborative interaction. I'd like to call bull shit on this. It relies on the fact that culturally we are willing to defend our voices but not our listening.

As primates, we humans are compelled to interact with one another, however, this common compulsion does not mean we are always consenting or open be interacted with or that we get to have/force an interaction whenever we want one. If this sounds familiar, that's because the same principle holds true about human sexuality.

In recent years there's been delightfully radical strides in conversations about consent when it comes to sex. I believe that these conversations can and need to be mapped onto all forms of human interaction. Let's practice & model consensual principles in our social lives. Consent is bigger than just sex. It can and should live in all things we do together.

On Apologies & Boundaries

Dear Internet: 

I'm writing to tell you I got a job last month. It's part time, so I'll still be making time to blow things up with my words, but I am, at the moment, still trying to balance my life now that it has some paid work in it. I am happy to have to job and love going in to it every day (even if it means waking up @ 5:30 sometimes). It's been great, but the frequency of my writing has declined :(


While I figure all this adult life stuff out I'll leave y'all with an old hunk of writing to chew on. Hope it satisfies!

                                                    -Wendy R.M.


I vow that the space surrounding my body will no longer be an apology. I will no longer take responsibility for your discomfort. The way your face rumples when I say the word queer is not my fault.

By most of my friends and myself I am known as a "tough" girl. The kind of girl who bites back at assholes and jerks when they try to step on my agency. I wasn't born this way.

I was lucky. I learned it. I was well taught by my loving old fashioned father how to find a strength of stance and confidence rarely privileged to those who share my gender. He warned me about other men who would not care about my strength or my confidence. I readied and honed my “fuck you”s for just such men. I wrote myself so many templates for fighting against male aggression and oppression. 

But no one told me how to say no to women, and that it's not okay for anyone, not just men, to touch me when I don’t want it. When they banned hugs and hand holding in the hallways of my high school nobody stopped my best friend from touching my breasts. Especially not me. 

Anti-consent rape culture is alive in the actions of more than one gender. It is alive in the actions as innocuous as the "guess who" game. You know when you sneak up behind someone and cover over their eyes? We glorify, normalize and often erotocize the unasked for aggressions on the physical boundaries of others. We call it "romantic", "spontaneous" and so often for women it’s deemed "adorable" or even "confident". It's not confident it is creepy, it is disrespectful. I might even be assault. And I will not stand for it anymore. The space around my body will no longer be an apology.

When/if you ignore my boundaries or assume that my boundaries are the same as other women or other queers that you've met, you lose my respect & I will become less comfortable around you. I'm not sorry for this. I won't banish you forever. I know that our culture has taught you that surprises, spontaneity, & teasing are romantic, but what you are playing with is somebody's boundaries for feeling okay in the world. Next time, just ask.