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Slut Walk London
http://slutwalklondon.tumblr.com/
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=197363420301422
Slutwalk London: The radical notion that nobody deserves to be raped.
On 24th January 2011, a Toronto policeman told a group of law students that in order to avoid being raped 'women should avoid dressing like sluts'.
This sparked outrage around the globe, with people from Chicago to Amsterdam standing up and saying that we have had ENOUGH of being victimised and labelled, with women speaking out for freedom, equality and fun.
Not only was this a ridiculous and inaccurate statement (women wearing trousers get raped. So do women wearing tracksuits, t-shirts, jeans, jumpers, skiing jackets and burqas. So do men), it was incredibly damaging to sexual assault survivors around the world, painting them as perpetrators - rather than victims - of a disgusting, violent crime. In addition, it completely erased the experiences of the millions of brave, strong people who have survived rape and sexual assault - painting them as human beings unworthy of respect.
Sadly, this is not a single, isolated incident. All over the world, women are constantly made to feel like victims, told they should not look a certain way, should not go out at night, should not go into certain areas, should not get drunk, should not wear high heels or make up, should not be alone with someone they don't know. Not only does this divert attention away from the real cause of the crime - the perpetrator - but it creates a culture where rape is OK, where it's allowed to happen... after all, she must have been asking for it, right?
NO. Let's raise our voices and tell the world that rape is never, ever OK. Not if she was wearing a miniskirt. Not if he was naked. Not if she was your wife, girlfriend or friend. Not if she was a prostitute. Not if he was drunk. Not if you thought she wanted to.
Let's end a culture of fear and victimisation. No means No - but rather than saying no, let's say YES. Yes to wearing what you want, going where you want with who you want and being able to express your personal sexuality in whichever way you please. Yes to having a great time without being scared that every man you meet is going to assault you. Yes to love, fun and respect.
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Down with All Imperialisms!
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It was an incredibly ignorant thing to say. How many rapes take place in nudist colonies? Then there's the fact it's rampant in countries where complete covering is required by law.
I'll be passing the information on to a local womens group I know. They're in no way revolutionary (i.e. "patriarchy whats that?") but they have said they'd like to start get involved with some activism.
I have a question though what's an appropriate way for men to show support?
As I have posted elsewhere (not this site) - is the 3 year old girl in her Winnie the Pooh pajamas or an 80 year old woman in her shawl something a "normal man" can't resist? Rapists are scum and the ones to blame. No matter what a woman (or man, boy, girl) wears is no excuse for such behavior.
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Goddamn I wish I was in London. Men can march too right?
The only Nazis I like are Grammar Nazis and ex-Nazis. I would say dead ones as well, but they tend to smell.
Mama's Whiskey-fried Fish Hoecakes, fried twice cause she wants me
Cross-dress.
[FONT=System]Long Live Proletarian Democracy!
Down with All Imperialisms!
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Yes...lets fight sexual objectification of women...by participating in it! Slut shaming, rapist excusing police officers are idiots - but the slut walk is a politically immature and irresponsible response. Adopting sexist concepts and trying to normalize and de-stigmatize them is not the correct approach, we should instead abolish them.
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You're being more incoherent than usual - which sexist concept is being adopted exactly besides word reclamation?
I always find these discussions confusing as hell. Whats sexist about sluts? I get that its meant generally as an insult, and I don't really think "reclaiming" some word is going to make any bit of difference, but surely you can see that women using such a word in a clearly ironic fashion, and marching to argue that women shouldn't be raped due to their sexual activity level isn't adopting a sexist concept, aside from perhaps the use of the word "Slut" which, even if that was the case, surely is hardly important.
Mabye you mean the idea that women want to dress attractively, or the standards of attractiveness, are sexist? What I don't even get that, surely feminism is about autonomy for people and freedom from overtly restrictive or damanging sterotypes applied too widely rather than the idea that women are unduly influenced by men and are anti sexist by violating gender norms and sexist or encouraging sexism by conforming to them, regardless of their own feelings or whatever?
Surely the misogyny of the term "slut" is found in pejorative uses, not in the literal definition of the term? "Slut" functions as a pejorative because "sluttiness" is viewed as an abnormality and an aberrance, so to normalise it is to remove its pejorative character.
The methodology of this movement is absolutely counterproductive to the goals which it claims to be working towards achieving. Everything about this concept is entierly absurd and pointless, it makes for nothing beyond an interesting pseudo news story beyond bourgeois feminist circles. Wearing sexually provocative clothing in order to fight the act of reducing the female gender to their evolutionary function just sort of plays into the hand of opponents of actual feminism.
I don't see it as promoting objectifcation. I think that is makes an important point. By wearing provocative clothing and saying, "I may be wearing revealing clothes, but you should have the self control not to treat me like an object and rape me because I'm dressed this way," you can promote the idea that women should be able to dress like a "slut" without being judged.
Surely the logical conclusion of people saying that it's promoting objectification is that women cover up so as not to be looked at as objects? How would that challenge current attitudes towards victim blaming?
"Her development, her freedom, her independence must come from and through herself. First, by asserting herself as a personality, and not as a sex commodity. Second, by refusing the right to anyone over her body; by refusing to bear children unless she wants them; by refusing to become a servant to God, the State, society, the husband, the family, etc. ... by freeing herself from the fear of public opinion and public condemnation. Only that, and not the ballot, will set woman free, will make her a force hitherto unknown in the world, a force for real love, for peace, for harmony; a force of divine fire, of life-giving; a creator of free men and women."~ Emma Goldman
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And you just completely blew whatever feminist-cred you may have had out of the water in about three different ways. Well done.
By recognizing that all sexual thought is a result of basic biological impulse and evolutionary programing? Is feminism something which must refute the nature of the natural world now?And you just completely blew whatever feminist-cred you may have had out of the water in about three different ways. Well done.
What is sexist is the culture of double standards when it comes to sexual practice.
Men who tend to sleep with as many women as possible are deemed "studs" or any other term which signifies respect and positive assessment.
On the other hand, women are "sluts", inferior in any aspect. It's not appropriate for women to behave like that.
The use of the word singals underlying sexist attitude.
That being said, I'm confused by something else: some of my friends, who happen to be women, gladly use the term in a denigrating way. I don't have an opinion on sexual behaviour of that sort, unless it is based on outright deception with regard to one's preferences leading to another man/woman being hurt.
As far as appropriating the word is concerned, I don't believe word recollection can help in combating sexism.
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“The possibility of securing for every member of society, by means of socialized production, an existence not only fully sufficient materially, and becoming day by day more full, but an existence guaranteeing to all the free development and exercise of their physical and mental faculties – this possibility is now for the first time here, but it is here.” Friedrich Engels
"The proletariat is its struggle; and its struggles have to this day not led it beyond class society, but deeper into it." Friends of the Classless Society
"Your life is survived by your deeds" - Steve von Till
By engaging in biological essentialism through the conflation of biological sex and gender, by reducing sexuality to reproduction, and by accepting the patriarchal conception of the female role in reproduction as passive.
Feminism doesn't demand that you refute biology, but it does demand that you refute patriarchal mischaracterisation of nature, which you have failed to do.
Also, on the "word reclamation thing": I really think that this goes deeper than just the label. It also challenges the concept of sluttiness, by challenging the notion that sexual promiscuity or behaviour superficially associated with sexual promiscuity- wearing revealing clothing being the obvious example- is something that may be legitimately condemned, or that it is something that rape-victims should be somehow held accountable for. It just so happens that you can't substantially reclaim the content of the term without reclaiming the term itself.
The female body is intrinsically viewed as a sexual object by the average male mind so as to encourage acts which will lead to reproduction, by encouraging behavior such as is seen in this quasi protest you are essentially asking females to incite the activation of evolutionary programming in an undesirable fashion. This is an act which is by its inherent nature something to be seen as regressive. Speak all you will of patriarchal culture and its repression of the female, but it does not change the evolutionary foundation from which it stems.
Progress in this field will only be achieved by moving beyond the primordial and misleading tendencies of crude thought driven by evolutionary biology, not by actively reverting back to its most basic functions. By approaching this issue with a shock and awe tactic of exposing the female body with the intent of proving some convoluted point of feminist empowerment, these individuals are only damaging any potential their message may have otherwise had. They are not going to remove the blunt male attraction to the female body simply through exposing it further, you cannot overwrite thousands of years of evolutionary development through protest of poorly planned defiance.
The fact that gynophillic men are physically attracted to female bodies does not in itself produce sexual objectification, and is the latter, not the former, which is problematic. A culture of objectification is built upon sexual and gender normativism- a social construction- it does not just spring inevitably from the reproductive mechanics of the human species. It's something artificial that must be disassembled, not something natural that must be transcended.
You severely overestimate the significance of cultural factors in this dichotomy. I do not refute that they are present to a noticeable extent, but they do not by any measure overshadow the evolutionary base which needs to be addressed when handling issues of this sort. It is the root foundation of evolution on which the cultural aspects of this dynamic are based, and thus you need to look beyond the veneer of such to handle the problem. As humans we are obviously capable of expanding on the starting point of our evolutionary programing with social constructs, but they still remain an indirect result of our collection of evolutionary impulse.
Well, the basic contention here seems to be your apparent claim- unless I have misinterpreted?- that male gynophillia leads to a culture of sexual objectification unless consciously avoided, and I think that it's really on you, rather than me, to flesh that out. For a start, you might want to explain why it is only male gynophillia, and not male androphillia, female androphillia or female gynophillia that produces such results. Simply observing that a lot of people like to fuck things isn't all that helpful.
