http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/02/26/we-saw-your-junk Comments On: "We Saw Your Junk" by Dan Savage en-us Copyright 2013 The Stranger. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, The Stranger readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact The Stranger. webmaster@thestranger.com (The Stranger Webmaster) Wed, 19 Jun 2013 00:00:01 -0700 Wed, 19 Jun 2013 23:15:00 -0700 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss When you take a break , go and click some advertises and make some tasks, i use clixsens for 1 hour a day, and I earn about 100 dolars in first week.After you create an acount , invite some friends to join this.you will earn comission from their earnings.
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Posted by Christian87]]> Thu, 28 Mar 2013 05:37:59 -0700 The Stranger
"who haven't actually done any research"
"on being able to do research"

That word, "research" ? I don't think it means what you think it means.

@62 You're welcome .
Posted by sissoucat]]> Sat, 02 Mar 2013 00:07:29 -0800 The Stranger Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Fri, 01 Mar 2013 12:39:26 -0800 The Stranger
A touch on the butt—actually a touch of any sort, even just brushing clothes—can indeed be considered assault under the laws of many states; you're right, but a man is going to find being felt up by a woman to be less unpleasant than a woman is going to find being felt up by a man, even if the exact same thoughts were going through the perpetrator's heads. I maintain that not all forms of objectification should be considered the same as sexual assault or rape. The kind of objectification that took place at the Oscars is another.

Men use PMS as an excuse to ignore and belittle women. For a woman to claim that she has PMS when she doesn't or to admit that she does but it shouldn't matter is for her to suggest that her reproductive system could possibly have been his business.

Yes, showing one's breasts is considered a transgression, albeit a mild one, in today's Western society. Maybe it shouldn't be, but it is. Yes, women face worse consequences for nudity than men do. Maybe they shouldn't, but they do.

As I said in post 27 and you said in post 64, when a man has sex with a woman, it's like he's winning something and like she's losing something. Maybe it shouldn't be that way, but it is. Ms. Valenti might believe that purity is a myth, but surely she'd agree that the double standard is real.

No, I mean that Russel said that men react similarly regardless of whether they were raped by a man or a woman.
Posted by DRF]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 19:57:01 -0800 The Stranger
objectify: (tr v) to present or regard as an object

object: (n) a material thing

You list a slap on the ass as an example of objectification and then you differentiate between objectification and sexual assault. A slap on the ass -is- sexual assault. It is a mild example but that's what it is. You mention that Brenda L. Russel suggests that men react similarly to women in a way that seems to suggest that you acknowledge that as true. But you also state that you (still) don't think men would mind. So which is it?

And in all seriousness, why should a woman deny having PMS or showing her breasts or having sex? You're buying into the idea that a woman acting on her own sexual agency is doing something wrong. Pick up a copy of The Purity Myth by Jessica Valenti. It's a good read and I think you might get a lot out of it.

@ 66 - Oh honey, really? Are you failing to make some kind of a point or are you just being tacky?

Do you want to know why I didn't like the song? It bothered me for two specific reasons: he mixed nudity in the context of the portrayal of rape in with nudity for titillation. And the cuts to the women mentioned made it clear that the audience was supposed to feel like we were laughing at them rather than laughing with them. It was mean. It was bullying. It was a rotten attempt at slut shaming. And if the man has even a sliver of influence, he might have actually managed to discourage other actresses from being topless on camera with his elementary school us vs them nonsense. Speaking as someone who thoroughly enjoys breasts, I would consider that a damned shame. Wouldn't you?
Posted by MiscKitty]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 19:28:36 -0800 The Stranger that as a compliment. I think that most of the actions that make women feel objectified, genders reversed, would not make men feel bad. One patron in a bar slaps feels another person's butt without permission. It's not appropriate no matter who's done it, but the man isn't going to feel as bad about it as the woman is unless he got felt up by another man. Going back to the song at the Oscars and the response posted above, the women cannot make men feel the way they've been made to feel simply by turning the tables.

For all of the responses you posted, the woman has to admit that the man is right. She has to either reveal private information (yes she has PMS and the man should go ahead and continue to disregard whatever she was complaining about as just PMS) or acknowledge that he got the better of her in a sexual situation (yes she did transgress by showing her boobs; yes she did find him attractive enough to sleep with).

Physical sexual assault is not the same thing as objectification. I would expect that male victims of sexual assault underreport more than women do. However, we must acknowledge almost all of them were assaulted by other men. Sexual assaults by women on adult men are rare, though a book by Brenda L. Russel suggests that men react similarly.
Posted by DRF]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 18:43:53 -0800 The Stranger
I ask because I don't know where you are getting the idea that men would enjoy being put through what women go through on a regular basis. Sure, lots of guys say they would like it. But the point that you don't seem willing to accept is that they have no real idea what they are saying they would like. They have a fantasy in mind - some idealized set of expectations of what it would be like. And the fantasy does not match the reality.

The reality is that male victims of sexual assault (read: physical objectification) under report the crime just like female victims. Male victims blame themselves, just like female victims. Male victims think they should have been stronger or fought harder or done more, just like female victims. And male victims feel like they are less of a man because of the experience. Not more of one.

So yes, you're absolutely right. Our hypothetical average straight male thinks he would like it. But he is wrong.

Off the top of my head just for fun:
"You have PMS"
-Yep, and you have a tiny dick. I'll get over the PMS. (Must be said with a smile and a wink.)
"We Saw Your Boobs"
-Wow, it was that exciting for you? What, have you never seen boobs in person before?
"We had sex!"
-Yeah, sorry I didn't call. It just got too weird for me there at the end... when you started crying.

But this assumes he has friends with him. In my experience, the fastest way to shut a guy down it to get his friends laughing at him. Usually at that point he'll opt to save face and laugh too. Just think of them as the audience and play to them. (Remember: that's exactly what he was trying to do. Just trade places with him.)

Regarding the scripted reactions, yeah, I've been turning that over in my head off and on today and the only answer I have come up with is schadenfreude.

The reactions of the women, whether they were scripted or taken from past Oscars, were intended to show the audience that the "We Saw Your Boobs" song wasn't about laughing with the ladies. In fact, by showing those clips Seth MacFarlane went out of his way to make absolutely sure we knew that we weren't laughing with the ladies; we were laughing at them. I know a lot of people have been on about how it was a joke so no one has the right to be offended but to me, that just doesn't quite work. I mean, if you tell a joke with the intent of hurting someone, isn't that just bullying?
Posted by MiscKitty]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:26:57 -0800 The Stranger
As I wrote in post @27, we're on the same page about sex, gender and power as perceived by our hypothetical average straight male.

By "the scenario you describe," I mean the thought experiment in @42 in which you described a woman accosting a man. If she'd been attractive, even if she was also intimidating, it wouldn't have been the same kind of problem. He could still brag about how a hottie was drawn to him.

I mean that women don't have a comeback that works. There's no comeback to "You have PMS" or "We Saw Your Boobs" or "We had sex!" that would diffuse the situation and put the crude initiator in his place. The woman would just sound like a whiner or in the case of the PMS comment, as if she were proving the guy right. But if you know a comeback that would work, I'd love to hear it.

Yeah, I'm not sure if the scripted reaction shots make it better or worse either, even assuming it's what happened.
Posted by DRF]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 12:35:07 -0800 The Stranger
Congratulations on being able to do research!
Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 12:25:43 -0800 The Stranger Posted by MiscKitty]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 10:44:38 -0800 The Stranger
I'm going to take your comments out of order because I think it will make mine more coherent. When I said there was a difference between the reality of objectification and the fantasy of objectification, I think I didn't elaborate enough to be clear. We agree 100% that a lot of men claim to get off on "being objectified." Where we seem to disagree is in our assessment of that fantasy. You seem to accept that the fantasy of being objectified coincides, for men, with the reality. You state:

@ 45 - "Men being objectified by women almost always find it pleasant and consider it an affirmation of their virility."

and

@47 - "being objectified by women is a male fantasy"

I posted this before but I'm going to post it again. I'd like you to take a peek at it. (It's a silly comic strip but it illustrates the point I have been trying to make.)

http://www.shortpacked.com/2011/comic/bo…

A beautiful stranger finding a man so irresistable that she wants him badly and immediately is an "affirmation of [a man's] virility." And it is a male power fantasy every bit as much as being strong and in control. Remember, sex is about power exchange in our culture. Why else would it matter, in a homosexual relationship, which man is the intersive partner? (Read: Which one of you is the guy?) Men are powerful. Women are weak. If a man fucks a woman, he is taking something from her. (For proof of concept: "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?" I'm sure you've heard that expression.)

But remember, the "objectified by a woman" fantasy is a fantasy. The reality leaves the "object" with a much different feeling. It's not reaffirming. Having a stranger think you're hot? Sexy. Affirming. Having a stranger treat you like a chair? (Really think about that, please. Objectification is about other people - even strangers - feeling entitled to treat you like a chair. They can touch you, move you, comment on you as a matter of course. No conscent necessary.) It leaves you feeling vulnerable and uncomfortable. It's not sexy.

@ 43 - "For the scenario you describe ... the woman has to be very unattractive"

You have it backwards. For the scenario you describe, the woman has to be very attractive. That's the way fantasies work. No one fantasizes about someone they aren't attracted to. The scenario I describe, on the other hand, requires only that the woman is able to make the man feel physically intimidated. (Why you equate "physically intimidating woman" with "extremely unattractive woman" is a whole other discussion.) I can assure you from personal experience that intimidation does not derive from uglyness. I have been grabbed and touched and moved in ways that made me feel extremely uncomfortable by plenty of men who were not at all unattractive. The way they looked had zero impact on how I felt.

@ 43 - "The man has a comeback."

So does the woman. I always have a comeback. And I'm quick on my mental feet and painfully practiced so it's usually a good one. Sure, he could say she was lying or drunk (both of which would sound pleading or desperate or defensive to everyone within earshot). Or he could come back at her with an insult of his own. But it wouldn't matter. It wouldn't make him feel any better. He wouldn't feel less violated or more in control. It wouldn't stop him from lying awake at night wishing he had done something else or something more or wondering why him what did he do to deserve that. It doesn't work that way. I wish it did.

Okay! Change of topic!

You also said @ 52 "And then there were the camera cuts to the women as their names were called. It was pretty clear that the fact that they were upset was supposed to be part of the show."

Those cut away shots were reactions from past Oscars. They were not the reactions of those women that night. (The shots of the actresses had them in different dresses.) This is extremely important because it even takes the victim's reactions away from them. The use of past footage to ensure that their reactions were "correct" is just one more example of objectification: they were reduced to mere props with no agency of their own.
Posted by MiscKitty]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 10:10:22 -0800 The Stranger
If you just have an easily flipped outrage switch based on other people's faulty reports, you're not worth anybody's time.
Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 09:36:16 -0800 The Stranger
@60 Thanks. I'd been wondering what you were getting at.
Posted by DRF]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 08:29:28 -0800 The Stranger
"Hey now, as a man, you can not speak on a woman's experiences, and as a woman, I find it offensive that you do. Now here is the truth about the male experience:"


Posted by Theodore Gorath]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 08:00:23 -0800 The Stranger Posted by undead ayn rand]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 07:27:08 -0800 The Stranger
But you go on with your bad self. Your hate is showing through just fine.
Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 02:47:48 -0800 The Stranger
Of course, they don't "even know the fucking context" : they're females ! How could they know anything that relates to humankind, huh no, mankind ?

All that smugness : just because 57 is both unable to work an answer around their ideas, that could both explain and promote his own ideas...

Why am I not surprised... If you don't want to grow up past your insecurities, just get naked and go back to your mancave, 57, along with every other unable-to-treat-females-as-equal males, who shout "la la la, I can't hear you, you're unworthy" at any female able who answer back to their drivel.

Then lock yourselves in, and proceed to objectify each other - among like-minded males, who consider objectification as a healthy passtime. I'm sure it will be such a treat to force-take pictures of each other's nuts and ass holes, then to comment them in a song and why not, to bet on whose parts will sag first ! So manly !

Hey, some of you might even get raped by the others, since rapists are so predominantly male... and maybe that'll be you ? All fun and games, right, nakedness and oogling and taking a feel or a fuck just make for so much fun, and there will ne nobody there to shame you for "rejoicing in sexuality" !
Posted by sissoucat]]> Thu, 28 Feb 2013 01:19:53 -0800 The Stranger
I didn't even read his or her response to @51 which proved he didn't even know the fucking context.

Fuck off.

Your pearl clutching is based on faulty information. Get off the Internet. You're too dumb to be on it. Jesus.

Also, oh look. It's clashfan. The moron who contributes only the minimum.
Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:39:04 -0800 The Stranger
Seth McFarlane didn't sing a song about healthy sexuality. He sang a song that maintained that the best thing a female actor could possibly do was take her clothes off. Why not, instead of, "Ha ha ha! I saw your BOOBS!!" focus on how viewers might show up to see the boobs but stay for some great filmmaking? Why not make a song that celebrates the risks that actors are willing to take to make an authentic films? If that's too advanced, why not write a song thanking the women for how happy they've made their male viewers? But he didn't.
Posted by DRF]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:24:52 -0800 The Stranger Posted by clashfan]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:14:00 -0800 The Stranger Posted by clashfan]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:11:22 -0800 The Stranger
It's not.

You two are shaming women for having boobs.

You two are shaming anybody who rejoices in sexuality.

You two are the most asinine assholes this side of One Million Moms. Who made Janet's wardrobe "malfunction" humiliating? You did.

It's obvious you two find complete shame in sexuality. Any sexuality. And it's obvious MRF is willfully trollfull.
Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 21:59:01 -0800 The Stranger
@50 It sounds less like I have selective memory and more like we don't have the same taste in movies. I didn't see Forgetting Sarah Marshall because it looked boring, and I didn't hear about any brouhaha. How about you tell me what it was that happened with that movie that you find relevant to this problem at the Oscars.
Posted by DRF]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 21:46:15 -0800 The Stranger
It's the shaming nature of the joke that bothers me, and probably a lot of other people. I mean, the joke doesn't work if the initial assumption isn't that the woman wouldn't want just anyone to see her boobs.
Posted by alguna_rubia]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 21:30:33 -0800 The Stranger
You have a very very VERY selective memory when it comes to male objectification.

Of course, women objectifying men really doesn't fit into your worldview of men objectify women only.
Posted by TheMisanthrope]]> Wed, 27 Feb 2013 21:27:20 -0800 The Stranger