Reading an excellent post by Joy-Mari at digital immigrant on how the Internet- rather than being the great hope of meritocracy- is struggling to break free from the brain shape of the usual suspects. I was reminded of the word 'slut', it's just one of many epithets referring to a woman that has had, or does have sex with specifically; men. More than one or a lot more, it doesn't have a distinct numerical definition.
Being a feminist person, I should be wholly concerned with it's effects on women. But from the first finding out what this and other words like it meant I've been struck by what it says about what males are taught to think of themselves. That feeling has never left me.
If merely by having sex with men, a woman despoils and sullies herself to the point of ridicule and abuse, what does this say about men?
It seems to say men are in essence filthy, that the penis is an injector (and therefore voids) emptying that filth into not just women, but also other men . Men who receive a shot of this toxic load (have a lower status within and outside gay circles than the 'injectors').
Now if men are taught to and continue this disgust and loathing of themselves-that is up to them.
However, what you give to yourself, you tend to wish to give to others, that impulse enables you to rid yourself of your degradation and then attack those you leave it in, destroying them in order to destroy it.
This shows that you cannot tolerate feeling this way about yourself, and attempt to rid yourself of these feelings, understandably. So here's the thing, why don't you just stop seeing yourself in this degrading way, what purpose does it serve?
Using others in this way is an attempt to separate and distance yourself from these feelings, pointless, because after they've walked away carrying it away from you; it's a case of continue and repeat. Maybe that's it's purpose, presumably, your cannot be trusted to simply have sexual desire because, you feel like having sex.
Cease to generate the poison. Then you won't have anything to void but love. Or am I missing something?
Dismantle it in yourself, smash it to smithereens. Deal with yourself, confront your disgust and give yourself the regard you can live with, then you can cut out the middlewo/man
Oy, have you ever tried to tell some dudebr0 how delusional his contempt for women really is? They just don't get it. They've been brought up to believe that they're the cat's whiskers, but at the same time, they loath themselves.
ReplyDeleteAnd women suffer because of that. And yeah, even well-meaning guys take part in this cycle.
...but at the same time, they loath themselves
ReplyDeleteHow true. That hatred of women reflects and enables their own self loathing to remain intact.
We just have to keep telling them this, until they begin to face up to it!
Also, our own refusal to carry these burdens- as part of our own efforts to liberate ourselves- mean that they will have to face up to themselves sooner or later. Here's to sooner.