Mar

18

Judge Rules Daughters Must Have Overnight Visits with Sex Offender Father

Filed Under Australia, International, courts, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 7 Comments

Trigger Warning for discussions of child pornography and child sexual abuse.

In Hobart, Australia, a family court has made a truly confounding and infuriating decision to require two girls to visit their father every other weekend, including an overnight stay — even though the father has been convicted on child pornography charges, the ruling also acknowledges the need for a lock on the girls’ bedroom door, and at least one of the girls is very much unwilling to go on such visits:

A Family Court judge in Hobart has ruled that the girls must visit their father every second weekend provided another adult is present in the home overnight.

The father involved in the case has been convicted of accessing child pornography and possessing child abuse products. He will remain on the sexual offenders register for at least another year.

But the judge has declared that it is in the best interests of the girls, aged eight and 10, that they spend time with their father, who cannot be identified.

He says there needs to be a lock on the girls’ bedroom door as the “father acts impulsively from time to time and that the children need some protection from him, especially at night”.

The mind absolutely boggles.

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Feb

23

Anti-Choicers Target Women of Color: How Should Pro-Choicers Respond?

Filed Under abortion, activism, anti-choice extremism, class and economics, feminism, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, pregnancy, race and racism, reproductive justice, social conservatives, women’s health | 7 Comments

Earlier this month, Renee wrote a post about an Atlanta billboard targeting black women’s reproductive rights by pointing to the higher rates of abortion among black women, and claiming that abortion clinics are attempting to abort black children out of existence. It’s a great post, touching on many things that will come up here, and you should go read it.

It turns out this issue is about more than a billboard campaign — SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Health Collective clues us in to the fact that it’s also turning into an issue of legislation and public policy. Anti-choice legislators in Georgia have introduced HB 1155 – The Sex and Race Selection Bill, and while it sounds warm and fuzzy on the outside, SisterSong assures us that it’s not (pdf):

This bill seeks to ban the solicitation and targeting of women of color by abortion providers throughout the state.

This misleading issue of abortions for sex- and race-selection in Georgia means that we have to use facts and science to stand up for women of color without undermining our support for abortion rights or without enforcing racial stereotypes about women of color. Intent on driving a wedge between reproductive justice and racial justice organizations, and pro-choice advocates, the bill reflects the false assumption that abortion providers throughout the state “solicit” women of color. If implemented, this bill will adversely impact abortion providers by requiring them to prove that they are not targeting women of a certain race or ethnicity. This burden could result in delayed medical services, particularly for women of color. Additionally, this legislation would alter the racketeering laws of the Georgia Code to include abortion providers. This is unacceptable as abortion is legal in the State of Georgia, and the alleged abuses of this medical procedure are unfounded. Such a bill would have a terrible effect on women’s ability to access reproductive health care services throughout the state.

While explicitly targeting women of color and attempting to coerce them into abortions would obviously be a horrific, racist thing, as the press release states, there’s no indication that it’s an issue requiring legislation. Further, the legislation is not a benign preventative measure, but an effort to restrict abortion access further than it is already restricted. The women who would be impacted, as is always the case, are those who are already marginalized. It’s clear that proponents of this bill, and those behind the billboard, do not have black women or children’s best interests in mind. They are rather simply opposed to any and all abortions, and find that non-white targets are easy to hit, for a myriad of reasons.

For all of the above reasons, and because I always trust people on the ground to know what is best for their communities much better than I ever could, I strongly support SisterSong in their campaign to defeat HB 1155. As of yesterday, the bill was approved through sub-committee, but the full Judiciary Committee has suspended consideration and not yet voted. SisterSong is urging Georgia residents to call Chairman Rich Golick of the Non-Civil Judiciary Committee TODAY and urge him to VOTE NO TO HB 1155. His office number is 404.656.5943, and his email address is rich.golick@house.ga.gov. If you are someone who can take action, SisterSong has also prepared a list of talking points for your email or phone call (pdf).

But while we are on the topic, I’d also like to discuss the subject of these types of anti-choice attacks a little more closely.

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Feb

15

Book Review: Promises I Can Keep

Filed Under books, class and economics, feminism, media, parenthood, paternalism, reproductive justice, reviews | 1 Comment

Book cover of "Promises I Can Keep." Depicts the title and authors' names, and a photograph of a white woman with two children.I’m the kind of person who hoards books, and finds difficulty getting the the time to read them all within what most people would consider to be an even remotely reasonable timeframe. While that’s something I’m working on getting under control, the consequence is that I’m also the kind of person, who, if she ever actually writes a book review, writes it long after the book has been released.

Such is the case with Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage, by Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas, released in 2005. As the title would suggest, this book is about low-income mothers who have had children outside of marriage, and why this often demonized (or pitied) demographic has grown.

The shortened conclusion is that low-income single mothers are overwhelmingly purposely choosing to carry pregnancies to term and desperately desire to have their children. Under the classist, and for women of color (the interview subjects were split evenly among women who are white, African American, and of Puerto Rican descent), racist, circumstances in which these women live, college and middle-class financial stability are not seen as attainable goals — or at least, not as attainable goals that having children will significantly hinder — and so choosing to wait until after these supposed milestones to have children frequently makes little to no sense.

Low-income single mothers being presented as rational decision makers, women who are making the choices best suited to their circumstances (rather than accident prone leeches on the system), is a rare thing indeed, and that’s why I was drawn to the book. To that end alone, I certainly thought that it was a worthwhile read, and would recommend it to others. But, at the same time, I also found that it had a few significant faults.

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Sep

30

The Today Show Uses Fear-Mongering to Demonize Midwives and Home Births

Filed Under media, misogyny, parenthood, paternalism, patriarchy, pregnancy, reproductive justice, women’s health | 7 Comments

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

The embedded video above is a fairly recent segment from The Today Show on the rise in midwife-assisted home births. It’s called “The Perils of Midwifery,” and it’s a segment which, it should be noted, uses almost entirely men as reporters and experts. And as you can likely tell from the title, it’s a segment which demonizes home births and midwives as much as feasibly possible.

The segment features the McKenzie family, who have suffered a horrific tragedy — their baby, who was delivered at home with midwife assistance, did not survive. Their story is clearly a heartbreaking one, and there’s absolutely no reason that it shouldn’t be told. At the same time, though, it’s also incredibly unfair for their story to be used in place of facts, or held up as an example of common home birth outcomes. Because while it is in fact one outcome that actually occurred, it’s far from a representative one.

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May

15

Abstinence Counselor Charged With Sexual Assault of Student

Filed Under education and schools, misogyny, objectification, paternalism, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, reproductive justice, sex and sexuality, violence against women and girls | 6 Comments

A man who counsels teens on how to remain sexually abstinent has been arrested and charged with sexual assault (from further descriptions, seemingly rape) of one of his “students”:

The girl told officers that Hoheb sexually assaulted her in his car in the parking lot of a Trumbull gym where he had stopped while driving her home in March.

In an interview with police detectives, Hoheb allegedly said he had been counseling teenage girls, including the victim, on how to say “no” to sexual advances from adults.

“I wanted the girls to understand that no matter who it may be; the pastor, another adviser or myself, they should not be afraid to use the word no,” police said Hoheb told them.

Hoheb also allegedly told police the girl had expressed interest in him, but he was determined to “nip it in the bud.” Although Hoheb initially denied having sexual contact with the girl, police said he later admitted having sexual relations with her in his car.

I learned of this story through Thomas, who argues that the rape in this case is consistent with the teachings of the abstinence counselor, as both abstinence-only teachings and sexual assault work off of a model where sex is seen as a commodity and female bodies are treated as sexual property.  I don’t disagree with him.

I want to take it a step further though and more closely discuss the counselor’s rather transparent excuse that he was attempting to teach the girl how to say “no.”  Yes, it’s an excuse, quite clearly, for how he was not really responsible for his actions because he was role playing, and she just misunderstood.  It is, in many ways, a variation on an old standard.

But in other ways, I think, it points to another aspect of rape culture that goes beyond just the apologism of “rape is often a misunderstanding.”  It points to the aspect where it is seen as the responsibility of women to say “no.”

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Apr

9

Missing the Point on Teen “Sexting” Cases

Filed Under assholes, legislation, misogyny, objectification, paternalism, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, sex and sexuality, sexism, sexual exploitation and harassment, slut-shaming, violence against women and girls | 46 Comments

You’ve probably seen a lot of media coverage lately around the phenomenon of teenagers sending nude or otherwise sexual pictures of themselves to each other, and the fact that a lot of parents, and more notably law enforcement officials, are really freaking out about it.

It wasn’t so long ago that I wrote about an outrageous case where a 15-year-old was arrested on child pornography charges for taking nude photographs of herself.  But these types of stories have since really taken off; and they’re even calling it “sexting” now, because what would a story about teenagers and sex be without more ways to make it inappropriately tantalizing?

Of course, the media seems to be taking notice not to talk about how girls are being exploited by law enforcement, and often the (usually) boys who they sent the photos to, but about how girls are Teh Slutty for taking pictures of themselves, and how poor boys are being punished for getting caught up in Teh Slutty themselves.  Like here at CNN, and in Thomas’ response to the article at the Yes Means Yes blog:

This article is not perfect, but it makes two really good points: First, that this is wildly and willfully excessive.

Should Phillip be punished? Yes. Should the six teens in Pennsylvania face consequences? Yes. But let’s kick them off cheerleading squads and sports teams. Make them do community service and take classes on sex crimes. Educate other teens on the dangers of sexting. Pay a price, yes, but these young people shouldn’t pay for this for the rest of their lives.

Second, that this ought to be a wake-up call that teen sexuality will develop, and that parents have a responsibility to shape it, which they cannot do by ignoring it

Now, what Thomas does here, again, is not new.  In the original article I wrote about, this issue also came up — the case of a girl taking photos of herself was compared with a case of a boy spreading photos of an ex-girlfriend without her consent.  And, in fact, he’s only agreeing with someone else presenting the problem.  So I could be accused of picking on Thomas here, but this upsets me precisely because I like Thomas, and because he wrote a really intelligent, much longer post on this topic recently.

This most recent post, on the other hand, totally misses the mark.  As Elizabeth says about a different but similar article: “it treats teens sending revealing pictures of themselves and teens sending revealing pictures of others without permission as if they were equivalent acts.”  And they’re fucking not.

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Mar

23

Observing and Reporting Rape Culture at Work

Filed Under assholes, marketing, media, misogyny, objectification, paternalism, patriarchy, pop culture, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 20 Comments

Watching random music videos on TV last night, this commercial for the new Seth Rogen film Observe and Report kept playing over and over again.  The basis of the film seems to be that Seth Rogen plays a quirky (according to IMDB, bi-polar — so yay, we can likely expect lots of “jokes” mocking disability and mental illness, too!) mall cop, who has to solve the case of a man who keeps flashing women at the mall.

Well I think we can all agree that this is a totally awesome and highly amusing premise for a movie.  So we should probably be unsurprised to see that just a few seconds in, there is a rape joke:

I imagine that the “joke” within the context of the film might possibly be that the line “everyone thinks they’re fine until someone puts in ‘em something they don’t want in ‘em” is referring to something other than a penis. If that’s not the “joke,” then the joke is clearly just “Ha! A penis in a woman that she doesn’t want in her! Whew, rape is hilarious!”

But even if it is the case, the “joke” is still “Oh, hey, that sounds like he’s talking about a penis! In her, when she doesn’t want it in her! Oh man, saying things to women that makes it sound like you’re talking about someone raping them is hilarious!”

And regardless of the context within the movie? The joke in the trailer is clearly the first interpretation anyway.

Actually, this isn’t the exact same trailer that I kept seeing on TV last night.  In the preview I saw, we also get a scene were Seth Rogen’s character grabs the female lead and starts making out with her right after she demonstrates how completely drunk she is by throwing up all over the sidewalk.  Get it!  It’s a joke!  Drunk chicks are awesome because you get to take advantage of them!

You can also rest assured knowing that when I was searching for this particular trailer on YouTube, I came across another clip from the movie that portrays women who are the victims of sexual harassment or assault as hysterical, helpless, over-reacting, obnoxious — and yet funny! — bimbos.

Aren’t we so happy that the Apatow clan is constantly purported by the mainstream media to be taking over and reimaging the entire comedy world?  God knows that we weren’t going to find a whole movie based on rape jokes before they came along!

Mar

20

When a Man is the Victim: A Second Study in Rape Apology

Filed Under media, paternalism, patriarchy, pop culture, race and racism, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 48 Comments

I’ve previously done an in depth analysis of victim-blaming and rape denial, and how it varies and how it stays the same, in a case of rape where a man was the victim of a female assailant.   After seeing this video at Sociological Images, along with the questions Lisa poses about the attitudes towards sexual violence it reveals, I’m compelled to do a second one.  The results are a bit long and wandering.

Below, rapper Lil’ Wayne appears on Jimmy Kimmel Live and (starting at about 2:40) is asked by the host whether or not it’s true that he “lost his virginity” at 11.  After looking shocked and attempting to laugh it off, Lil’ Wayne tells his story, and it may be triggering to some of you.

I do not know what Lil’ Wayne would call his own experience, but though he does not use the word, the admittedly few details he provides do indeed portray this quite clearly as rape, for reasons that I hope are obvious to most readers here, and which will be delved into in more detail below.  Lil’ Wayne seems to me to be uncomfortable with the line of questioning, and yet Jimmy Kimmel and the other man on the show continue to laugh and joke around about it, even after Lil’ Wayne says very clearly that the experience was harmful to him.

It seems like a reasonable question, to ask what the hell is wrong with Jimmy Kimmel.  But the problem is, while not excusing his actions for a single second, that he has a whole culture (and audience) backing him up.

In the majority of sexual assault cases, where a woman is the victim of a man’s violence, rape apology is rooted primarily not in the denial that male violence exists, but in the denial that male violence means something and needs to be stopped.  Conversely, in cases where a man is the victim of a woman’s violence, rape apologism is strongly rooted in the denial that women’s actions can count as violence at all — and especially that their actions can count as sexual violence against men, who are routinely construed as incapable of being victims.

In cases of both of these two types of sexual violence (though hardly the only two that exist), the victim is accused of “wanting it.”  But while the female victim is also, when that reasoning fails, accused of deserving it, this seems to not be the case with men.  No, they just always wanted it.  (Again, talking only about male victims of women — gay male victims of other men are routinely portrayed as “deserving” it as well as “wanting” it.)  There are no sneers about what he should and shouldn’t have been doing.  Just jokes about how awesome the assault must have been for him.  Like we see Jimmy Kimmel engaging in above.

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Feb

28

Arizona Legislature Considers Numerous Abortion Restrictions

Filed Under Republicans, abortion, anti-choice extremism, assholes, legislation, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, politics, reproductive justice, women’s health | 10 Comments

Just as anti-choice, time-wasting nonsense gets cleared up in South Dakota, we find ourselves some more in Arizona.  Indeed, as Miriam and Ann note, anti-choicers seem to be going pretty wild all over the nation.

This particular piece of ugly Arizona legislation would impose a whole ton of restrictions:

Legislation to impose the first new restrictions on abortion since at least 2002 coasted to easy approval Wednesday in the House Committee on Health and Human Services.

Democrats, seeing they were going to be outvoted anyway, walked out, leaving their Republican colleagues to vote 5-0 for HB 2564.

Since 2002, abortion foes have managed to get various measures through the Republican-controlled Legislature only to have each vetoed by Democrat Janet Napolitano.

This bill mandates women be given certain information, in person, about their unborn child and their legal rights if they keep the child. It allows a wide range of medical professionals to refuse to provide abortions, allows medical professionals to refuse to provide the “morning-after” pill, and changes the regulations for minors getting an abortion without parental consent.

The article then goes on to say that there’s also a 24-hour waiting period included in the bill, along with requirements that the woman be told at the start of this period all about prenatal services available to her, as well as “the probable anatomical and physiological characteristics” of the fetus at her particular stage of pregnancy.

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Feb

24

Hundreds of Adult Sex Workers Arrested in “Child Prostitution” Stings

Filed Under class and economics, misogyny, paternalism, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, sex and sexuality, sex work, slut-shaming, violence against women and girls | 43 Comments

I love how this headline at CNN reads “Operation Frees Dozens of Child Prostitutes” rather than “Over 500 Prostitutes Arrested Under Guise of Saving Children.”

In the three-day operation, which began Thursday night, the FBI, along with local and state law enforcement agencies, took the 46 girls and one boy — all of them U.S. citizens ages 13 to 17 — into protective custody.

“Operation Cross Country II” involved efforts in 29 cities and resulted in the arrest of 73 pimps and 518 adult prostitutes, the FBI said.

Those arrested could face federal or state charges, depending on their alleged activities.

Nice, eh?  I mean, yes, excellent — 47 children were rescued from a rape trade.  Surely, that’s a good thing and worth the huge sums of money spent.  But is it necessarily worth over 500 female adults being laden with these serious charges, and ultimately I’m sure being subjected to intense public humiliation, for doing nothing more than attempting to make the best living they know how?

And far more importantly and far less fraught than that question: why do we assume that in order to do one, we must do the other?

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