I worked at Petsmart while in college- an excellent part time job with many memorable experiences.
So, the public figures have been tumbling, one after the other, as I sat over here and stalled on a blog post for most of the month. (Combination of 3 weekends away from home capped off by a family shared cold. Damn you, worn down immune system!) But here’s what I can say about recent events: Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out, sexual predators… mostly because I bet you’d like it.
And today I read about that most annoying and insufferable public journalist… Garrison Keillor. Writer’s Almanac… BARF. So breathy and over emoted! Prairie Home Companion… so under emoted and full of off key warbling and just boring story telling- I’d open my veins before I have to listen to it. And yet, people bought his schtick! How in god’s name I don’t know, but I saw this comment on an article earlier: “Not Garrison Keillor! Who’s next, Santa?!” And I have numerous problems with that comment, but my main one is to ask if the guy who makes you sit on his lap is the best example to use there?
Anyway. Tumble away, dominoes.
Tumble away.
If the quote had been- “I can do what I want- punch them in the back of the head- and I can do it because I’m famous. I just can’t stop myself. I don’t even ask I just start punching” – this would be a much more clear cut argument, right? That’s assault! End of story! You sick bastard!
But you take it into the muddy world of female sexual identity and societal perception of collective ownership of the female form… well that gets a little harder to wade through. Because the boundaries are blurred (They really shouldn’t be, this should really be quite clearcut here.) and what is even seen as impinging gets muddy.
Let’s break it down:
Who can impinge? (No one, you ass.) What action is impinging? (If you have to ask- then that.) Is impinging so commonplace that it’s seen as okay? (Short answer yes. Long answer… also yes. Damn.) Is that how you spell impinging? (Turns out yes.) Is impinging really the right word I should be using here? (Ah. Yes, the perfect one. High five, Vocabulary.)
I am thankful that all the Trump signs make it easy to figure out where to not go trick or treating.
I was 35 and walking through our downtown with my husband. Some douche leaned out of a car driving by and aggressively yelled: “HOT CHICK!” at me. At us. I was holding my husband’s hand. I was wearing a maxi dress and just about as covered up as if I’d been wearing a burkha.
Continue reading “The Sexual Micro-Aggressions Faced by Being Female”
I am a TOTAL feminist. I am a totally bad feminist.
I roll my eyes at pink camo and most pink clothing. Yet I totally SAY everyone can/should/ nay, MUST wear whatever the hell they want. So which is it? That indulging in pink overload is a personal choice or an example of someone blindly throwing themselves into cultural expectations of gender identity and handing their decision making abilities over to the patriarchy? Gah. You damn hypocrite, me.
I am a TOTAL feminist. I am a totally bad feminist.
I’m working on it…
Voting
“Remember those who died to give us the right to vote.” I hear this (or some such derivative of it) all the time here in Texas, especially in the fall. Needless to say as much as I love my state I also see it as a good opportunity to develop my patience skills daily. Sometimes hourly. The people saying it invariably mean: thank the military, as if that is the main goal of the military complex. And as if the biggest threat, historically and presently, to our voting rights is some shadowy foreign power we need the military to protect us from. The truth is and was darker than that.
I don’t know how many other 35 year olds have a 1917 “Votes for Women” poster on their living room wall, but this one does. I guess the fact that Raggedy Ann has been around for 9 years longer than my gender has had the right to vote just strikes home for me. So when I remember “those who died to give me the right to vote” I remember Mary Paul who fought and died to help give me, female that I am, that right. Women and men were beaten, tortured, and imprisoned for trying to give women the vote. Mary died for it. So I don’t care if you spend 3 hours on that ridiculous nail art- those nails should be clicking against the screen in a voting booth when you have the chance!
(Seriously. I don’t get the nail art thing. At all. Sooo at all. But whatever, I’ll protect your right to waste your time if you want! Freedom!)
I also remember all the people who died spreading the right to vote; including James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Micky Schwerner who were murdered in 1964 during Freedom Summer. 1964. That means people were killed for trying to bring the right to vote to their fellow citizens a year after the computer mouse, Weight Watchers, and Brad Pitt came into existence. Why do I care so much about that? Because by god if you have to be touched by injustice yourself before you’ll care about it that makes you a terrible person!
History should be faced with open eyes, not squinted at sideways through pink Oakleys. Which are ugly anyway but that isn’t the point. The truth is that those who died to protect our right to vote were our fellow citizens and they were killed… by our fellow citizens. But by god, look who won! It was at such a terrible price, though… and I don’t forget.
I remember.
(image by Turneor)
the something garden 