tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post657984467571528921..comments2024-03-13T11:14:26.768-04:00Comments on A Radical Profeminist: Question: When Catharine A. MacKinnon speaks truth to power, what do dick-whipped white het men in power call the reality she addresses?Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger51125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-51384773977171343252010-03-17T05:08:49.368-04:002010-03-17T05:08:49.368-04:00For many white people I know, whether they live be...For many white people I know, whether they live below the poverty line as adults is, of course, not a form of privilege. But being raised middle class and/or having a high level of literacy and/or academic education, along, at times, with family to depend on for financial help (I'm not saying this is the case for you, as I don't know), means that one's life in poverty as an adult is quite different than the life of a white person raised in poverty, without much literacy or quality educational opportunities.<br /><br />Having said that, it is very clear to me that a racist capitalist patriarchy WILL pay women more to be sexually available to men than to do anything else. And I have known many white women who have considered doing sex work to pay for college. I talked every one of them out of it, except for one, who did strip for a short time, until being fired.<br /><br />The other women found other ways to get through college, which has generally meant being in debt. I cannot, in good conscience, advocate for women to go to college, in the U.S., anyway, where the cost is so absurdly high, except at some community and state-funded schools, if one is a resident of that state. Or if scholarships are available, which seems to be increasingly not the case.<br /><br />As a fairly literate kid, by white middle class standards, I learned far more out of college than in college. I've read far more out of college than in college, even during my years in college! And I do know a young white middle class college-educated woman who is economically on her own, who has found ways to make a living doing many things that are not things many people do to earn money. She works off the grid in some ways and instances. <br /><br />She is one of the women I talked out of doing sex work. What the women came to see, not primarily through talking with me, is that the emotional, spiritual, psychic, and political cost of being in sex work was not worth the cash.<br /><br />I understand and do appreciate the dilemma you face. Were I financially strapped, and were I to have a high level of control over the procurers, I might consider some form of sex work myself. And I suspect it would propel me into depression pretty fast. And that's me, with my own history with men, use, and abuse.<br /><br />You mentioned possibly having a bipolar condition. So this, too, if my own bipolar family members are any indication, greatly limits what you can and cannot do for work.<br /><br />So as noted earlier, I won't be someone trying to talk you out of doing sex work. That's your choice.<br /><br />And I will, rather fiercely and militantly, argue against legalising prostitution, in alliance and allegiance with all women who suffer because prostitution exists and thrives, most especially girls and young women of color being trafficked and pimped globally, who will not benefit from prostitution being legalised anywhere in the world, in the view of many feminist activists across the globe--many of whom escaped prostitution that is not like what you have done, in so many ways.<br /><br />And, as always, I feel a certain kinship with you. I both like you and I respect you. My respect for you and my liking you are not contingent on whether or not you choose to do sex work to earn money.<br /><br />I especially like your willfulness and sense of righteousness in arguing for what you believe in, even as you are questioning aspects of it. I like that a whole lot. Brava to you. And let's keep conversing, if you want to. If I had a sister, I imagine she'd be a lot like you. I think your temperament and mine are similar.<br /><br />You seem to have more patience than I do though. I'll try and learn about patience while you read up on anti-racist stuff. And I'll also keep reading up on anti-racist stuff too!Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-79463610678629795782010-03-17T03:06:23.366-04:002010-03-17T03:06:23.366-04:002 quick notes, as I'm off to bed.
First, the ...2 quick notes, as I'm off to bed.<br /><br />First, the Audre Lorde comment was off-base as hell, I realize, and should have edited it out. I knew it was, hence my caveat at the beginning, but didn't actually remove it, which was kinda dumb. Sorry about that.<br /><br />Second, this conversation, at this point, isn't actually about you. I don't really take offense at what you blog about, and have actually quoted bits of your site(along with a lot of other stuff I've been reading) occasionally. Particularly a fan of your acronyms and the 'dick-whipped' concept.<br /><br />I'm engaging with you here basically because you are someone who engaged with me in meaningful dialog. Someone who knows more about a subject I have interest in, is willing to talk(a lot), and generally take me seriously. There's a certain irony in me 'learning' about radical feminism from a guy, but whatever. Really, I need to get to a library and read more of the actual source material, this has been challenging to manage.<br /><br />Actually, final thing: yes, privilege, I have it. White, middle-class-speaking, well-read, autodidactic and all that. I also have never broken above the poverty line in any single year, and likely never broken over 3k in a year doing anything -other- then sex-work. So capitalism isn't exactly doing me a lot of favors. White supremacy -is-, hugely. <br /><br />Hell, that reminds me. I need to start poking out info on 'anti-racism for ignorant white people'.DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-54443474064743251112010-03-17T00:28:15.982-04:002010-03-17T00:28:15.982-04:00If prostitution is illegal and demonized it will f...<i>If prostitution is illegal and demonized it will fester in the black market.</i><br /><br />I totally disgree with you, as do many women in those systems around the world with far fewer privileges than you have.<br /><br /><i>We need to wrest the power to control and define sex-work out of the hands of men.</i><br /><br />Good luck with that project. I think you'll find radical feminists are working to do that far more than liberal to conservative antifeminists are.<br /><br /><i>If sex work were legal, and I could have supportive sisters to work with, good bouncers to handle trouble, and still maintain my own independence of schedule and choice of clientele, I might go back to it.</i><br /><br />And I'm against it being legalised, and all I do is write at a blog, so I don't think I'm much of a threat to you wanting it legalised. You won't have to contend with me, unless you willfully choose to go out of your way to do so, in your struggle to legalise prostitution. You will have to content with fucked up right-wing and liberal-ass men who hate women.<br /><br /><i>In some ways, it was the best job I ever had, by far.</i><br /><br />That doesn't say much for work options for women in the U.S. And if it is the best work option available to you, then do it. I'm not calling the cops on ya.<br /><br /><i>In some ways it was by far the worst.</i><br /><br />Then I don't support you doing it. Anything that leads to you feel like "this is the worst thing I've ever done" is not likely to be something I'm going to be that supportive of you doing.<br /><br /><i>And most of those ways were directly related to legality, loneliness, isolation, lack of safety and support, and the general systematic societal shame.</i><br /><br />Racist capitalist patriarchy is designed to make people feel lonely, isolated, and like criminals, unless they are white het, class-privileged men. For the rest of us: shame and blame.<br /><br /><i>It was so disheartening to get into reading about modern feminism and find so many little echos of that shame.</i><br /><br />Does reading Alice Walker, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, and Andrea Dworkin make you feel ashamed of yourself. If so, what is it in their writing that makes you feel ashamed?<br /><br />This is what Therese Stanton, the woman who organised against men who want prostitution to be legal and available to them, said:<br /><br />The burden of proof will be on those of us who have been victimized. If I [any woman] am able to prove that the picture you are holding, the one where the knife is stuffed up my vagina, was taken when my pimp forced me at gunpoint and photographed it without my consent, if my existence is proved real, I am coming to take what is mine. If I can prove that the movie you are looking at called Black Bondage, the one where my black skin is synonymous with filth and my bondage and my slavery is encouraged, caused me harm and discrimination, if my existence is proved real, I am coming to take what is mine. Whether you like it or not, the time is coming when you will have to get your fantasy off my ass.<br />--Therese Stanton, "Fighting for Our Existence"<br /><br />How does reading that make you feel? I'm asking you sincerely.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-40341573641424194552010-03-17T00:28:07.070-04:002010-03-17T00:28:07.070-04:00But not what prostitutes and non-prostitutes do to...But not what prostitutes and non-prostitutes do to earn money. I hear that my language makes some women feel like I'm judging them, and it may well be condescending in some ways, and I guess I can strive to speak more clearly and accurately about my feelings and views. But, honestly, if any prostitute thinks I'm the fella they should be concerned with, I'd have them look around as a reality check of who the men are who actively and outwardly display anti-prostitute misogyny and racism.<br /><br />I'm curious: are the women who feel this way about what I write women of color? And women without class privilege? Because several very privileged white women have taken issue with my position on the men who use women in prostitution.<br /><br /><i>It's not that much of feminism actively shames sex-workers. It is that sex-workers are dealing with a mountain of shame and when reaching out to our sisters for community, we here that what we are currently doing(if still engaged), is wrong.</i><br /><br />Can you distinguish me saying that what I think men are doing is wrong, and what women are doing is wrong? I don't think males who are prostitutes are "wrong". I think they are earning money--hopefully they are and not pimps--from selling their bodies. And I hope they get out soon. And if that's "shaming", I also think poverty should end too. And I don't assume that poor people take that to mean "I'm shaming them". And my poor family members don't take my critique of our system as shaming them for being poor.<br /><br /><i>Whether or not that is intended, that is how it came across to me, and has to others I have known.</i><br /><br />I don't hold much value in my intentions. What matters is the effect of what I do. So I am interested to know how women experience what I say. And, also, what I say has to be sought out, from this blog. And no woman has to come here to get through her day. So if a woman doesn't like what she reads here, she can leave and not ever read anything I write again.<br /><br /><i>Until we can find a way to kill patriarchy and misogyny(and possibly after), there will be a demand for prostitution.</i><br /><br />I agree. Because so many goddamned men are mutherfuckers who demand a constant supply of women and children to stick their dicks into or wiped their dicks onto.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-35909198145603246242010-03-17T00:27:41.301-04:002010-03-17T00:27:41.301-04:00My experience and those like mine are not, and sho...<i>My experience and those like mine are not, and should not be central in the discussion.</i><br /><br />Well, I agree. I mean it should be central in YOUR life. For sure.<br /><br /><i>But I have met a lot of sex workers, and most have been more like me then like the stereotype.</i><br /><br />That doesn't surprise me, given your privileges. Your world and the worlds of the more oppressed women in those systems are not that likely to overlap. That's why I'm encouraging you to reach out to Ruchira Gupta, to speak with girls and women she has worked with, and also with First Nations women in Vancouver, Canada, and with Vednita Nelson in the U.S. <br /><br /><i>I have not met any women who have been trafficked,</i><br /><br />But we know millions of women and girls are trafficked.<br /><br /><i>nor any who were manipulated/forced by pimps as children.</i><br /><br />That sounds to me like whites who say, "I've never seen a Black person" or a rich person who says "I've never seen a homeless poor person".<br /><br />That doesn't tell me anything about the extent to which such oppressed people do exist.<br /><br /><i>Such women do exist,</i><br /><br />And are the majority.<br /><br /><i>and it is important their voices are heard but they are not all of the women in sex work.</i><br /><br />And the poor are not the whole of people in a capitalist system who do wage work. But I am more accountable to the poor in fighting poverty and capitalism, than I am to middle or upper class folks.<br /><br /><i>And to hear many people talk about prostitution, people like me simply do not exist.<br /><br />Characterization of sex-workers purely as victims, negating the possibility of their agency, is harmful.</i><br /><br />Not as harmful as pimps, procurers, men on the Right and the Left who argue there's no harm in prostitution at all.<br /><br /><i>When I hear "I hold nothing against a woman for whatever she needs to do to survive in this CRAP.", or things like it, I here a silent ", but what you do is disgusting." And I've talked to other women, and I know I'm not the only one.</i><br /><br />DanceDreaming, I feel not at all that what any woman does in prostitution is "disgusting" or that any woman in prostitution is "disgusting". I think what men do in participating in those systems, as pimps or procurers, IS, necessarily, harmful and oppressive, NOT necessarily to EVERY woman in the same way, but to woman AS A CLASS in harmful and oppressive ways.<br /><br />I don't think you've ever heard me state that I think what any woman does, period, in or out of systems of prostitution is disgusting. <br /><br />Check that. I think white women's racism is disgusting. I think anyone's anti-Semitism or rich women's classism or anti-Muslim bigotry is disgusting. Gross and disgusting. Yes. I do.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-23881526304015026602010-03-17T00:26:32.144-04:002010-03-17T00:26:32.144-04:00The characterization of the entire 'industry&#...<i>The characterization of the entire 'industry'(not an appropriate term, but I can't think of one) by it's most awful examples. The low number of actual sex worker voices in the discussion -about- sex work.</i><br /><br />How do you know that? How do you know which radical feminists were and were not inside those systems, and impacted by them? Did you know Andrea Dworkin sought out young men for sex, to get paid? When she was homeless and poor? Did you know the woman who organised ALL the campaigns to get the Dworkin-MacKinnon anti-pornography ordinance passed in North America was on the street, controlled by a pimp, as an adolescent?<br /><br />Neither woman had the privileges you do, at the time they participating on those systems of harm and exploitation.<br /><br />I would say you, as a white woman, are accountable to Vednita Nelson on this issue, and I think Audre Lorde would agree. Please see this post for more on what she has to say:<br /><br /><a href="http://radicalprofeminist.blogspot.com/2010/01/prostitution-where-sexism-and-racism.html" rel="nofollow">http://radicalprofeminist.blogspot.com/2010/01/prostitution-where-sexism-and-racism.html</a><br /><br /><i>I have heard 'sex-positive' activist being called rape apologists.</i><br /><br />Were they making rape seem like it wasn't so bad a problem?<br /><br /><i>I have heard sex-worker rights activists told that they have internalized misogyny.</i><br /><br />Don't we ALL have internalised misogyny and racism?<br /><br /><i>The marginalization of the concerns of quite feminist sex-workers rights advocates and groups in feminism concerns me.</i><br /><br />More than the way male misogynistis marginalise sex workers by thinking of you and them as "wh*res" not "good girls"? By dividing women up this way?<br /><br /><i>Despite the fact that a huge focus in such groups is harm reduction.</i><br /><br />I am fully supportive, and always have been, of women doing activism that makes their lives safer and better. I can't speak about or for those feminists who are critical of activist groups of women working for better conditions within systems of prostitution. How do those women--the women you know--speak about radical feminists (the ones who were prostitutes)?Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-61722965404982798572010-03-17T00:26:06.925-04:002010-03-17T00:26:06.925-04:00Just my personal perspective, and a fair amount of...<i>Just my personal perspective, and a fair amount of it from my own misunderstandings, but not all I think.</i><br /><br />I appreciate you owning that, because that's a lot of what I see when I hear women criticise feminists: misunderstanding of where those feminists are coming from, or misunderstanding what those women are saying and doing. And I don't think the sole problem here is that you're "not getting it". I do feel that way about some people who stop by here: that they are just willfully not wanting to get what feminists are striving to do. <br /><br />I see you as VERY sincerely searching and struggling to integrate what you know from your life, and from other sex workers' lives, with what you also know from what you read.<br /><br />I wish you would contact Ruchira Gupta, and have her put you in contact with ex-trafficked girls and women. Really. Because I think you need to know why she is against the legalisation of prostitution. <br /><br />Ruchira wasn't in one of those systems of harm. And she doesn't have race privilege, or "First World" privilege, and I believe Audre Lorde would support you listening to her and being accountable to those kids and women who were sex-slaves and who were trafficked, when formulating your ideas about this matter of men sexually exploiting women and children, globally.<br /><br /><i>The language used to describe sex work, and the way it robs women of agency.</i><br /><br />Please read the last quote by MacKinnon. I'll copy and paste it here:<br /><br />'[T]hose who point out that women are being victimized are said to victimize women. Those who resist the reduction of women to sex are said to reduce women to sex. Subordinating women harms no one when pornographers do it, but when feminists see women being subordinated in pornography and say so, they are harming women. Words do nothing except when feminists use them. Go figure.' -- Catharine A. MacKinnon, Women's Lives, Men's Laws, page 350.<br /><br />What do you make of that?Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-55895811760836985812010-03-17T00:25:45.738-04:002010-03-17T00:25:45.738-04:00I feel that although all feminists are more suppor...<i>I feel that although all feminists are more supportive of all women (including interesting defenses of Palin) then misogynists are, that there is still an element of shaming much some of the language around prostitution in feminist circles.</i><br /><br />I agree. It can be there, at times. And again, that isn't for me to "correct", and by and large that's not what I hear. I hear women--usually not feminists and usually race and class and education privileged women--making excuses for why systems of harm and oppression aren't so bad.<br /><br /><br /><i>I am talking about the frustration, confusion, and betrayal I felt when initially trying to get into studying this.</i><br /><br />I get how that would not sit right with you, and could turn you off to a movement, or a collection of writings that you wanted to relate to and support.<br /><br />I could take "generalisations" about men as reason to reject feminism, and many men do. But I get what the fucking point is. I get what feminists are talking about: classes of people exploiting and abusing and subjugating other classes of people. Not EVERY class-privileged person does ALL the same kind of harm. And not EVERY class-subordinated person experiences the same forms of subjection, harm, and exploitation. That's not the point, though. The point is that the systems are harmful. And they harm people based on classed identities, unjustly and inhumanely.<br /><br />So let women speak about men in a generalised way, because it's a sociological/systemic/structural/institutional/class analysis. It's not a psychological/anecdotal/interpersonal-only/individual analysis. They don't have to support the experiences of those of us who are fine with how things are, because those of us who are relatively fine CAN ONLY BE SO because the majority suffers, and THAT, to me, is THE POINT. Whatever you decide to do, or have done, has an effect on all women, women you don't know--women who do not have class, race, or education privileges. The procurers who pay you for sex use that experience to fuel their fucked up ideas about their being "whores" and "good girls". You get to do it, and I don't really care if you do or you don't. I'd prefer you don't, though.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-68315554796315440722010-03-17T00:24:16.385-04:002010-03-17T00:24:16.385-04:00I hear you saying "Prostitution isn't rea...I hear you saying "Prostitution isn't really all that bad. I hear you saying it does all the things feminists say, but it's not THAT bad for ALL women in it."<br /><br />Am I hearing you correctly? If so, do you get how my benefiting from capitalism--how the ways it works for me, how the ways white supremacy works for me, a white Jew, DOESN'T work for most people who aren't so privileged as me? And I know very well that anti-Semitism lives and breathes heavily down the necks of Jews of all colors, and seeks our destruction. I know that. I know that non-Jewish white folks want to peg all Jews as "rich" and "in charge" when, you know, we're not. This ain't no Jewish Nation I live in, much as some Christian White Nationalists might want others to think it is.<br /><br />I find it racist of you, white supremacist of you, to reference Audre Lorde about the nexus of racism, heterosexism, and sexism, and compare that to your situation as a relatively privileged white woman. She wasn't speaking about you. She was speaking about her very silenced Black sisters.<br /><br />Have you read "The Uses of the Erotic"? I never heard her calling for people finding value in exploitation. I recall her wanting something more for women that acceptable levels of economic and sexual exploitation. <br /><br />I heard Andrea Dworkin calling for NO sexual exploitation of women, period. None. And I'm down with that.<br /><br />Please quote the women who you feel are putting you down or shaming you. Name them and quote them here. I can't respond to "women you've heard feel shamed by feminists". Which feminists? In what speeches and essays and books?Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-74762332113826054382010-03-17T00:23:53.570-04:002010-03-17T00:23:53.570-04:00The women I know who have been raped and exploited...The women I know who have been raped and exploited by men who see women as being "for men" do not benefit by me participating in that system of exploitation. They don't get anything positive from that choice of mine. What they get is the knowledge that yet one more man can take advantage of his entitlements to use people who have made themselves available, willfully or less willfully, with or without significant privileges.<br /><br /><br />I hear you wanting me to accept that there are women who want to sell their bodies for sex and that there are women who want to have sex with men, for money. That's not new information to me. I know that. I've also thought about getting money from men for sex. I've thought about selling myself to men, not with a pimp, because, well, I could and it would confirm to me my function, as taught to me by my assaulter: I'm for men. I'm for sex.<br /><br />You're not in that category. You're more empowered and less damaged by the world, according to what you've told me about your life.<br /><br />I know a very academically and street smart white woman--IQ through the roof--who left high school and became a stripper and then became a teacher. She tells her students--female and male and trans, "Well, you know, those feminists are wrong--those anti-sex, anti-male feminists are wrong. I wasn't 'only victimised'. I wasn't 'only violated'. Did I feel victimised and violated sometimes? Sure. But was it my choice to be there? Damn straight it was. And I don't appreciate women telling me I didn't make a willful choice!"<br /><br />And I don't appreciate her teaching mostly eighteen to twenty one year-olds that the women fighting to stop prostitution were "anti-male" or "anti-sex". And I don't appreciate her misrepresenting those political views, or collapsing them by claiming "all those second wavers" were "essentialists" and "anti-sex" and "anti-male".<br /><br />I can't and won't draw a parallel between Audre Lorde saying that race-privileged women need to be more accountable to women of color, with privileged white women telling women who have been harmed by male procurers that they need to be more sensitive to those who were not so harmed.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-58426126954277239662010-03-17T00:23:11.030-04:002010-03-17T00:23:11.030-04:00I hear you telling me procurers or W.I.M.P.s are s...I hear you telling me procurers or W.I.M.P.s are sometimes sad and lonely and depressed. And they are very entitled and privileged men too. Yes? Of course they are sad, lonely, and depressed. We all are to some degree, aren't we?<br /><br />You have told me the men you had sex with, for money, weren't abusive to you. I'm glad. But what do you want me to take from that? I already know that not all men harm women in the same ways. But did those men, the sad guys, have wives they were cheating on? Were they being dishonest with girlfriends when being with you? Were they harming THOSE women? <br /><br />I'm often sad and depressed and lonely too. And I don't think it's okay for me, a white guy, to take those feelings and let them entitle me to use people, by paying them for sex. And if I do that with my feelings... I welcome any and all feminists to call my ass out on exploiting someone sexually. And that doesn't say anything about the man I might have sought out.<br /><br />It doesn't tell us what his level of privilege is, what the circumstances are that led him to sell his body for money, what his abuse history is, etc.<br /><br />But me doing that--me exploiting someone sexually, with money for sex, is not okay. Period. That's the position of this blog and most of the women I know.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-10243765086701381032010-03-17T00:22:08.276-04:002010-03-17T00:22:08.276-04:00I've heard women say "I don't experie...I've heard women say "I don't experience what feminists say men do." Ok. So? So does that mean the millions who do should just shut the fuck up? I hear privileged women trying to shame feminists for speaking out about stuff that some women want to do and feel good about. Like being capitalists, white supremacists, and women who engage in systems designed to harm women, to subordinate women, to disempower and exploit and violate women, and tell activists "Don't put me down for what I choose to do!"<br /><br />I think the criticism is misplaced. I do. Go tell the men who abuse all the women who ARE abused, to stop harming women, if you want feminists to stop speaking out about patriarchal systems of misogynistic harm and horror.<br /><br />In my view, feminists don't have to acknowledge or pay tribute to those women who defend prostitution as socially good or redeemable.<br /><br />Go tell the raped kids around the world who procurers abuse that your experience isn't theirs. Tell them. And tell me who is shamed in the process.<br /><br />You shame is real, but it's not what the feminists I've known personally for 25 years are fighting about: they aren't fighting so you can feel shamed by feminists. They are fighting a very real battle in a very real war zone, that I have lived in and apparently you have not.<br /><br />I don't see the world the same way you do. I don't. I see women choosing men as partners--because lesbianism was never presented as a viable option, even when I know those women have had feelings for other women. They choose men. Yes, they do.<br /><br />I know men who don't do the worst of what men do to women and their female partners calling them "good men". I see them as sexist men, and the women call them "good men". Why do they do that? Why don't they also call them "sexist men"? My answer is this: because they can't, really. They can't afford to know what I and my woman friends see in these sexist "good guys". They've invested years of their lives in supporting these sexists guys, so what would it mean for them to say, "Well, actually, he's kind of a jerk sometimes." It would mean they might have to re-assess being with him. If they feel they deserve to be with someone who is NEVER a sexist jerk, ever.<br /><br />I see women staying with fucked up abusive men and saying "He's really not all bad."Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-88025843629913553142010-03-17T00:21:29.772-04:002010-03-17T00:21:29.772-04:00The least harmed women may, or may not, have a gre...The least harmed women may, or may not, have a great deal of privilege relative to the most harmed: the sex slaves, the trafficked, the women whose lives are being controlled by pimps, economics, and drugs.<br /><br />That's not you. I hear you. You feel shamed by some of how feminists speak. Do you get how privileged it is to complain about how anti-prostitution feminists speak, at all? And to compare that with what Audre Lorde was addressing?<br /><br />As if... as if it is not patriarchs who brutally shame women, daily. As if it is not men, not feminists, who harm women in grotesque, unspeakable ways, using speech and using fists, and using penises. Making children and women feel responsible, fully, for the harm they endure at men's hands and dicks.<br /><br />I am one of THOSE people: the one who was shamed, silenced, by a man sexually assaulting me when I was twelve. I don't give a fuck about him and I'm glad he's dead. And I know he fucking abused so many other children, and tried to get a whole lot more.<br /><br />So if some adolescents tell me "I liked having sex with adults and it was my choice to do so"--and my best friend in childhood DID choose to have sex with adults when he was fifteen, with strange men, over a hundred before he turned 17... I'm not "representing him" when I speak out against child sexual abuse. And if he feels invisibilised by my contempt for perps, for men who seek out sex with kids, I can live with that. So can he. What people can't live with, and commit suicide over, is being raped, sexually assaulted, incested, molested.<br /><br />And, NO, I didn't call you or any woman a child. My point is this: among ANY oppressed group, including among children, but among ANY adult population of oppressed people, there are those who will say, and believe, and experience, that "it's not really that bad". Well, FOR THEM, maybe, it's not that bad. But for MOST it is.<br /><br />Now, please hear that those who oppose capitalism get to do so without giving voice to and for those who do alright in it. <br /><br />Anti-racism activists do not have to note how successful Bill Cosby and Oprah Winfrey have been when decrying the abuses of white supremacy and poverty, which is gendered female and raced Black and Red and Brown, disproportionately. Does EVERY Black person suffer equally because of white supremacy? No. Of course not.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-7068562416705686072010-03-17T00:19:32.798-04:002010-03-17T00:19:32.798-04:00DanceDreaming,
I will remind you this is a radica...DanceDreaming,<br /><br />I will remind you this is a radical activist blog.<br /><br />It's not a discussion blog. I welcome you to discuss stuff, but that's not what this blog is for. It's for supporting radical womanist and feminist women, and I have no plans to make it do anything else any time soon.<br /><br />It's the only male blog I know of that does this. So I think having one is okay, without apology.<br /><br /><i>I just recently that awesome speech of Audre Lorde you have up, so please forgive any inappropriate appropriation here. As far as some feminist women shaming sex-workers, from my personal experience, it -does- happen.</i><br /><br />Everything happens, DanceDreaming. The issue is what is typical, normalised, accepted as harmless that is, in fact, harmful.<br /><br />No feminist I know of is stopping any woman who wants to sell sex from doing so. Right?<br /><br />So feminist language is experienced as shaming to some women in prostitution. True that. <br /><br />This is not a top priority concern for me, to be honest. It's not for me to tell feminists who use language that some sex workers feel shamed by to "tone it down a little" or "could you always make sure you include the women who are most empowered in systems of prostitution?"<br /><br />Women, girls, boys, trans folks being coerced, manipulated, violated, injured, beaten, raped, and killed, inside and outside systems of prostitution is part of the population of women the feminists I know seek to empower and liberate, with their assistance. <br /><br /><i>Was Lorde wrong to note that although the feminist movement was more supportive of black women then misogynist men, they were less supportive then they could be? then they should be?</i><br /><br />I hope the part where Audre Lorde speaks about the need to make real the voices of the most silenced women, the most marginalised women, the poor women, the women in the Third World, is critical to even forming feminist theory and practice.<br /><br />I hope you hear Andrea Dworkin always calling for the same thing: to hear the women without race, class, and education privilege. To hear the women who are so shamed by violence they dare not speak out at all.<br /><br />DanceDreaming, I hear your appeals being like the rich saying "when anti-capitalists speak about how horrible a system it is, how much it robs people of choice and dignity, they're invisibilising the dignity and choice I feel I have within capitalism."<br /><br />Do you get why that's problematic?<br /><br />It's not the least harmed women or most empowered women, or the women who want to promote prostitution as "socially good" that I'm especially worried about. Nor, as an anti-capitalist, am I especially concerned about folks like me, who are financially secure. My experience is not including in the words and theories of people who do anti-capitalism work. And I don't want it to be, either, except to note that some of us--the vast, tiny minority, do fine in capitalism while the majority suffer it's abuses, structured poverty, systematic injuries. You know what I mean?Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-54721112680001602302010-03-16T18:16:45.286-04:002010-03-16T18:16:45.286-04:00I just recently that awesome speech of Audre Lorde...I just recently that awesome speech of Audre Lorde you have up, so please forgive any inappropriate appropriation here. As far as some feminist women shaming sex-workers, from my personal experience, it -does- happen. <br /><br />Was Lorde wrong to note that although the feminist movement was more supportive of black women then misogynist men, they were less supportive then they could be? then they should be? I feel that although all feminists are more supportive of all women(including interesting defenses of Palin) then misogynists are, that there is still an element of shaming much some of the language around prostitution in feminist circles.<br /><br />I am talking about the frustration, confusion, and betrayal I felt when initially trying to get into studying this. Just my personal perspective, and a fair amount of it from my own misunderstandings, but not all I think.<br /><br />The language used to describe sex work, and the way it robs women of agency. The characterization of the entire 'industry'(not an appropriate term, but I can't think of one) by it's most awful examples. The low number of actual sex worker voices in the discussion -about- sex work. <br /><br />I have heard 'sex-positive' activist being called rape apologists. I have heard sex-worker rights activists told that they have internalized misogyny. <br /><br />The marginalization of the concerns of quite feminist sex-workers rights advocates and groups in feminism concerns me. Despite the fact that a huge focus in such groups is harm reduction. <br /><br />My experience and those like mine are not, and should not be central in the discussion. But I have met a lot of sex workers, and most have been more like me then like the stereotype. I have not met any women who have been trafficked, nor any who were manipulated/forced by pimps as children. Such women do exist, and it is important their voices are heard but they are not all of the women in sex work. And to hear many people talk about prostitution, people like me simply do not exist.<br /><br />Characterization of sex-workers purely as victims, negating the possibility of their agency, is harmful. When I hear "I hold nothing against a woman for whatever she needs to do to survive in this CRAP.", or things like it, I here a silent ", but what you do is disgusting." And I've talked to other women, and I know I'm not the only one.<br /><br />It's not that much of feminism actively shames sex-workers. It is that sex-workers are dealing with a mountain of shame and when reaching out to our sisters for community, we here that what we are currently doing(if still engaged), is wrong. Whether or not that is intended, that is how it came across to me, and has to others I have known.<br /><br />Until we can find a way to kill patriarchy and misogyny(and possibly after), there will be a demand for prostitution. If prostitution is illegal and demonized it will fester in the black market. We need to wrest the power to control and define sex-work out of the hands of men.<br /><br />If sex work were legal, and I could have supportive sisters to work with, good bouncers to handle trouble, and still maintain my own independence of schedule and choice of clientele, I might go back to it. In some ways, it was the best job I ever had, by far. In some ways it was by far the worst. And most of those ways were directly related to legality, loneliness, isolation, lack of safety and support, and the general systematic societal shame. <br /><br />It was so disheartening to get into reading about modern feminism and find so many little echos of that shame.DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-6071008008974242892010-03-16T16:15:38.370-04:002010-03-16T16:15:38.370-04:00As you may well know, prostitutes in the areas whe...As you may well know, prostitutes in the areas where the Republican National Conventions happen are far more busy than those in the areas of the Democratic National Convention. Right wing men, contrary to many claims, are the men who most abuse women, in many ways, because they are disproportionately wealthier, can travel more to poor places where they can rent and buy human beings, often children, for the sole purpose of raping them and calling it "sex".<br /><br />As we know, priests are not infrequently sexual abusers of nuns, other women in the church, and children, female and male.<br /><br />So I'd rank white wealthy men identified with and active in Right-wing (or liberal) agendas along with pimps and procurers (those who are not also Right-wing), as THE shamers of women--women inside and outside systems of prostitution. "Feminists", in my view and experience, don't even rank on the list of groups who shame women.<br /><br />I think how many people interpret what feminists say about prostitution, pornography, and sex, do not appreciate the perspective and accounts they have heard. <br /><br />Feminists, by and large, who work in the areas of stopping sexist/racist sexual violence against women, do so by speaking with, listening to, and working alongside women in prostitution, pornography, and systems of making sex into sexism and racism, and sexism and racism into sex. I don't know of any feminist activist who does that work without such alliances and accountability in place.<br /><br />To me, the "feminists shame women" line is, relatively speaking, unfounded and spurious. I think this is a myth--quite a misogynist one and an antifeminist one as well, needless to say.<br /><br />After all, every antifeminist and nonfeminist women and men and trans folks I know make it a part of daily life to be far more contemptuous and vile and woman-blaming when it comes to understanding and assessing the actions of women, than do feminists, generally speaking.<br /><br />Nonfeminist women and men I know routinely and unapologetically call women "b*tches" and "*wh*res" and "c*nts". This is shaming, yes? Pimps do this, yes? Not feminists. And when ANY feminist I know has done so, she immediately owns it as misogynistic and not okay. NONE of the nonfeminist and antifeminist people I know apologise for it, or even think there's anything wrong with it.<br /><br />And that's just on the matter of speech acts.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-24016139086672137772010-03-16T16:15:27.152-04:002010-03-16T16:15:27.152-04:00Dear DanceDreaming,
I both welcome and appreciate...Dear DanceDreaming,<br /><br />I both welcome and appreciate your comments. You needn't ever apologise for them. I want your voice here, in this discussion.<br /><br />I am very open to continuing our conversation on all these and related matters. I thank you, most especially, for your honesty in owning the privileges you have had and have in being able to make the choices you did.<br /><br />I have a lot of questions and comments, but will hold onto them for now, as I could get rambly as hell--lol--and want to spare you, and other readers here, that experience!<br /><br />I will mull over what you have said. There are older comments here as well that I've neglected, to date, to respond to.<br /><br />Thanks for letting me know you're still open to this discussion. :)<br /><br />I greatly admire your willingness to engage in complex, honest, conversation. <br /><br />For the record, I do not support ideas that "all prostitutes are sex slaves" or that "women in prostitution aren't making choices". Nor, for that matter, do most of the radical feminists I know. As noted, some of the women I have known came out of systems of prostitution--none with the privileges you had when entering it.<br /><br />I think to take the views of the most privileged in any system of harm and exploitation as "central" is a mistake. This shouldn't negate or silence your voice, but, as you note, to speak as a privileged minority in a system which holds nothing but contempt for women and a believe in their existence as fuck-holes for men, means we have to consider what it means to speak in favor of the system itself.<br /><br />I noticed, with some alarm, that you note how the right wing and some feminists "shame" women in prostitution, without mentioning pimps and procurers as a fairly significant constituency who shames and abuses the women in prostitution: far more, I'd argue, that feminists and the right wing--assuming those right wingers aren't also pimps and procurers, which is not an assumption I'm prepared to make.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-2507861930388120422010-03-16T00:30:52.486-04:002010-03-16T00:30:52.486-04:00And here I had planned to simply write a quick ...And here I had planned to simply write a quick 'I've been reading your recommendations and see what you mean' post. Ah well.DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-70259080965147119162010-03-16T00:23:44.365-04:002010-03-16T00:23:44.365-04:00But the more I read, the more I am uncertain. The...But the more I read, the more I am uncertain. The more I question. My experience is -not- the norm it seems. My motivations and intent are not that of the majority of sex workers, though I have met others like me who struggle with the same dilemmas. The majority of women in prostitution experience it as a much more degrading and disempowering phenomena.<br /><br />And my actions do not occur in a vacuum. The personal is the political, and my choices have consequences. The fact remains that prostitution as it exist does help support patriarchy. It does tend to support men's belief in their entitlement to women's bodies. We do live in culture with rampant rape-fueling ideologies, where 'feminine' is coded as 'sexual', 'vulnerable', 'object'. A system which creates an unconscious, invisible condition of predator/prey relationship between man and woman. And prostitution as an institution seems to be a direct concentration of all this.<br /><br />I do find myself wondering though. I try to imagine a world free of patriarchy, free of class and racial inequality, free of inherited wealth and power. And I feel that even in such a future, there will be those(men and women) that for various reasons, will have difficulty finding situations of sexual pleasure. And that in this world, as each will give according to their ability and inclination, perhaps some will still have as their contribution, or part of it, a creation of sexual pleasure for these ones. <br /><br />Because this is why I chose to be a 'courtesan', and what I tried to make my sex work mean. That I failed to keep the darker aspects of the work from overwhelming me, that the darker aspects of prostitution -as it exists- as a whole far overshadow what value the action has in society, does not wholly rob it of all value.<br /><br />I hear often it said that men must learn that they do not have any inherent 'right' to the body of any woman. And I feel this is true. And that they must learn they do not have a 'right' to sexual pleasure. And this I wonder at. Perhaps not a right. What is a right? But it -is- a large part of being a happy, healthy human being. <br /><br />I don't know. Perhaps in the cultural context of thousands of years of male supremacy, of women as commodities, and women's sexuality being owned and traded by men, of men lying, manipulating and simply assaulting in the name of sexual conquest; in light of the current and ongoing circumstances of women being bought and sold, valued above all else as sexual objects; in light of the horrors committed daily by traffickers, pimps and procurers; perhaps procuring -should- be illegal.<br /><br />I don't know. I have much to think about here. Of course, whatever I decide on this, whatever you feel, this is just one discussion, in the footnotes of one blog. Society at large, and feminism in particular, will continue to grapple with this question for some time to come, I think.DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-40958414682082685782010-03-16T00:23:44.364-04:002010-03-16T00:23:44.364-04:00Hello,
So, I've been pretty busy with things,...Hello,<br /><br />So, I've been pretty busy with things, but have been plugging my way through your recommended reading. And I must say, it's led me to some interesting thoughts. Some of which I need to mull over a lot more before I can say much about. But a lot of it is being incorporated into my worldview/epistemology. <br /><br />One thing I will say here. I couldn't get through the comment section of 'On Engels and Gender'. The commentary was powerful, and very interesting. But eventually aggravating. John and Charles continuously not getting what people were saying to them was just too much. And I guess that was part of the point of me seeing it, yes?<br /><br /><br />-----------<br /><br />I guess where I was coming from, at the start, and why I pointing out the issue being 'about Mackinnon', was my own grappling with 'the pornography/prostitution question'. And MacKinnon seeming to be one of the crux points of that still lively discussion.<br /><br />The point from which I come is that of a women who -chose- prostitution. Granted, the choice did not occur in a vacuum. As a highly educated high school drop out, well spoken young white woman, with little to no employment record in her late twenties, with few recognizable marketable skills, and mental circumstances that make most standard employ virtually impossible(undiagnosed bi-polar, likely). <br /><br />More, living in a capitalist culture, and feeling a strong societal demand that I do -something- to 'meaningfully contribute to society' in order that society would deign to allow me the privilege of such extravagances as eating and having a place to sleep, along with the social validation that comes with not being destitute. And a desire to not get trapped in a long dreary series of entry level jobs, lasting until the day I could collect a meager social security check.<br /><br />From this perspective, sex work seemed a positive choice. And hearing people rob me of the human dignity to have made that choice, by telling me it was something 'done to me', creates a certain distress. And I reacted over-defensively.<br /><br />More I have often felt, within my understanding, my own worldview, that prostitution need not inherently be such a negative thing. There is no denying that at currently it is fairly awful. Even when entered in the most positive, uplifting, hopeful fashion, the nature of prostitution as it exists is disheartening. Entered in other contexts it can be downright gruesome.<br /><br />But I have felt, and now find myself questioning, that sex work could be a positive social role. Granted, one that may be made obsolete or irrelevant in a non-monetary system. But within capitalism, since it still exists, I feel it -could- be(as much as any other 'job' in capitalism). If the social stigmas around sex were challenged, the virgin/whore dichotomy challenged, if sex workers united and stood up for one another. If there was some capacity to take pride in sex work, instead of the shame pushed onto us by both the religious right -and- much of feminism. <br /><br />It could be a valued thing. Being a sex worker, an -intentional- prostitute, seems to me to involve more then simply being a warm willing hole that a man can pay for(and insinuations to the contrary hurt). It involves learning techniques, and creating an experience(I have taken a certain pride in being -good- at what I did, more then in any other job I have ever held). It involves adding to the pleasure of the life of another human being, which is the heart of all meaningful labor, to me. If it could somehow be separated from, protected against, or even used against, the deep misogyny of much of the clientele...DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-56539739658061844282010-03-06T14:33:57.023-05:002010-03-06T14:33:57.023-05:00I really appreciate your commitment to thoughtfuln...I really appreciate your commitment to thoughtfulness, your passion, your desire to challenge.<br /><br />(Hmmm: things we share in common!)<br /><br />Believe me, I don't mind your "novel length" (lol--hardly!!!) comments at all. I'm well known for them myself, so that's something else we have in common!!! ;)<br /><br />I don't think you'll find Stan's blog discussions to be those vile ones I know all about too. He allowed a range of comments, but not from complete jerks or trolls. Well, usually! lol (It was never an unmoderated blog, in other words.)<br /><br />I think you'll rather enjoy the conversations I linked to, and search around there--there may well be others you'll like reading. I think or hope you'll find them intellectually engaging and politically relevant.<br /><br />And, after you're done reading as much of that stuff at Feral Scholar as you'd like, I will pick up with you here, to discuss more. <br /><br />I think I sort of made it sound like I'm closed to such conversation with you, but I hope I didn't. What I meant was that it is rarely fun for me anymore. I've been doing it for too long, maybe, without a break. And the subjects are not AT ALL abstract for me. But I sense, given your history, they aren't exactly "abstract" for you either.<br /><br />But I really like you. From what I can gather from your posts, I like you and your holding to ideas and beliefs that are meaningful to you, while also being open to examining them in a strangely and militantly radical place like my blog.<br /><br />Andrea Dworkin once said something that has ALWAYS stayed with me--that those who despise her would never imagine she'd have said (I'll paraphrase):<br /><br /><b>We must always stand naked before reality, and adjust our sense of truth accordingly.</b><br /><br />This was a challenge to never get too comfortable with any belief system, with any ideology, with any point of view.<br /><br />Because it is, after all, a point of view.<br /><br />The information you most recently shared with me helps me have a MUCH better sense of where you are coming from and the social world in which you live. I know of a world very similar to that one, that I have access to but refuse to be part of. I refuse because there's an overwhemlingly liberal point of view there, that views all radicals as weird. That they don't get how freakin' weird liberalism is, well, is annoying as hell to me.<br /><br />What you most recently shared helps me feel like engaging with you more here, in this conversation between us.<br /><br />I'm open to doing that, DanceDreaming. I wanted you to know that, especially since I've now recommended that you enter the world of Stan and De's blog!! You can come here to reflect and ask questions and post challenges to what you read there, if you don't wish to do it with Stan and De directly.<br /><br />De, especially, has written comments that are, more than anything you or I have done to date, "novel length". And she's quite brilliant too. I trust her perspective more than Stan's, which has wavered quite a bit in some ways, over just the last few years. De has intellectually and actively been engaged with feminism for decades longer than has Stan, even though they are approximately the same age. He put down his understandings in a book called "Sex and War". De's writings can be found in various places, I think, online.<br /><br />(I sometimes call it "Stan's blog" because for a time De--a white lesbian radical feminist--was a regular commenter there, not "officially" a co-moderator of the blog, <i>Feral Scholar</i>. I think with them being good friends, he thought it would be best to have a woman with him on that level. So it became Stan (who is het and white and not Jewish) and De's blog.<br /><br />Again, I think you'll rather like what you find there.<br /><br />And let me know, okay? You don't have to read it all before checking in here with me about any of it.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-15116368302160037402010-03-06T02:42:29.552-05:002010-03-06T02:42:29.552-05:00Off to read your links.Off to read your links.DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-53661406694767156422010-03-06T02:42:29.551-05:002010-03-06T02:42:29.551-05:00Hi,
So, I'm not sure if I really want to go s...Hi,<br /><br />So, I'm not sure if I really want to go see a blog conversation in an unmoderated forum that has people being belligerent and closed-minded. I've seen that before. I'll take a peek, though. It might be helpful, dunno.<br /><br />I seriously don't want to be that person. That's why I started with an attempt at a feeler. To gauge whether conversation on this was welcome. Then, I went and just unloaded my ideas before getting a gauge on things. Sorry.<br /><br />I'm trying to open my mind. I've spent the last several months obsessively reading everything about this subject I can get my hands on. <br /><br />I was trying not to be someone who says 'That issue isn't important to focus on, because this other one is more important'. But I think I did just that. One of the reasons I don't have a blog yet, and have been reading way more then commenting(this conversation as a huge exception), is that I'm, most of the time here, more interested in hearing and understanding other points of view then trying to convince people of mine. <br /><br />My world isn't a war zone. I'm buffered from that by a thousand thousand things. My word is inhabited by unhappy desperate people, struggling to hold onto the lives that makes them miserable. But most of the struggle is in the realm of ideas, ideals, power and privilege. Not in violence, abuse, or torture. <br /><br />The war in the world I can see, was I go through my day to day life, involves psychological warfare. Social structures of control and manipulation. <br /><br />I'm buffered by race, by class. I'm buffered by living in a place where queer liberal idealogs have carved out a place of some privilege. Where being a loud, assertive, queer women with blue hair is welcome. Where I have some of the privileges classically reserved for men only.<br /><br />I came to look into feminism heavily, finally, via sex work. I started looking into things because I had time, between sessions, to read. And because I was angry. I was angry about the illegality of prostitution and how it made me less safe. I was angry about seeing airbrushed images of nearly naked 'idealized' women everywhere. I was angry that my sister feels forced to gender her children, particularly her soft and gentle son. I have long been angry at capitalism, at class-based privilege.<br /><br />I was angry that discussion of gender imbalance was so polarized. Men and many women on one side loudly proclaiming that it wasn't a big deal, that there wasn't really a problem, or that is was mild. And on the other side, what seemed to me to be angry, confrontational oppositionists. An embattled, embittered camp with grievances, but unwilling or unable to present their case in a manner that could engage the neutral. The people in the middle.<br /><br />When I first looked at your blog, months ago, I find it very...challenging. I thought your ideas were pretty over the top. I've since learned a lot, and have been finding your ideas making more and more sense. <br /><br />I feel bad that my first major commentary here has been so confrontational. I got hit close to home, I guess. But I think, despite my time working, that talk of sexual slaves, talk of trafficked women, talk of the oppression of prostitutes, isn't really about me. <br /><br />I've since read a lot. I understand now why most online conversation on the topic is somewhat closed. I've seen how vile it can get when conversation, when debate opens up. I know why it is important to not allow conversations to decenter the oppressed. <br /><br />I'm likely confrontational here because I want my choice to have been a right one. I felt like I was helping people, or at the least not hurting anyone. And the money was far better then anything I've managed before or since. <br /><br />I still feel a lot of these ideas are challenging to me. One of the reason I want to comment, I want to discuss, is because I want to understand. But I think I should stick with mostly reading, less novel length commentaries.DanceDreaminghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11066121340716179756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-9960092190751250072010-03-05T22:04:16.054-05:002010-03-05T22:04:16.054-05:00@DanceDreaming,
Correcting a typo here. This:
......@DanceDreaming,<br /><br />Correcting a typo here. This:<br />... and what follows, that is not written by men, reflects the values and politics of those authors, not of me. ...<br /><br />Should say ... "that is not written by me, reflects the values"...<br /><br />And, again, I'll reply to some of your comments next time.Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744114065733119575.post-34900186470513878152010-03-05T19:50:30.634-05:002010-03-05T19:50:30.634-05:00@DanceDreaming,
That last link is out of chronolo...@DanceDreaming,<br /><br />That last link is out of chronological order. Sorry about that!Julian Realhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02933612851144914687noreply@blogger.com