Here’s the definition of hebephilia, according to Psychology Today:
Hebephilia is the sexual preference for early adolescent children (those roughly ages 11 to 14). Some evidence suggests that hebephilia is a distinct and discernable erotic age preference. But whether it qualifies as a disorder is the source of debate as critics believe including it in the DSM [The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the bible of health care professionals in the United States] would pathologize a reproductively valid behavior. The DSM workgroup on sexual disorders is the main proponent of hebephilia, and much of the supporting research has been done by them. The disagreement has been strong and at times nearly unanimous; a straw poll conducted by the American Association of Psychiatry and Law resulted in a vote of 2 for and 31 against inclusion of hebephilia in the DSM. Whether or not hebephilia will ultimately find its way in remains to be seen.
Pedophilia, which many people in the media have accused Roy Moore of, is defined as follows (again, by Psychology Today):
Pedophilia is defined as an ongoing sexual attraction to pre-pubertal children. [It] is considered a paraphilia, a condition in which a person’s sexual arousal and gratification depend on fantasizing about and engaging in sexual behavior that is atypical and extreme. Pedophilia is defined as the fantasy or act of sexual activity with children who are generally age 13 years or younger.
On the one hand you have progressive outlets all over the place crying “pedophilia!” about Moore, calling up images of mentally ill people with often uncontrollable urges toward pre-pubescent elementary school kids not old enough to reproduce. For example, you have the twitter hashtag #RoyMoorePedophile and this Daily News headline calling Moore an “accused pedophile.”
…It was a different world. Forty years ago in Alabama, people could get married at 13 and 14 years old. My grandmother, at 13, was married, at 15, had two children and a husband and a job. If Roy Moore was guilty, if he was at the mall hitting on this 14-year-old, 40 years ago in Alabama, there’s a lot of mamas and daddies that would be thrilled that their 14-year-old was getting hit on by a district attorney.
Let’s be clear: while it’s not accurate to call Moore a pedophile, it is accurate to call him a child predator, because 14 year olds are minors well under the age of consent, puberty and “40 years ago” be damned!
As this Washington Post opinion piece argued, misnaming Moore a pedophile dismisses “his willingness to exploit the unequal power structures of gender and age to victimize young girls who couldn’t stand up to him”:
Like Moore’s alleged victims, the vast majority of those who suffer child and teenage sexual assault are girls. But this does not demonstrate that the United States is a nation of men afflicted with pedophilia. Rather, what we should take from the sobering statistics about assault and abuse is that many men use the power of their gender and age to target those who are particularly vulnerable and those they can pressure into silence.
Here’s another problem with calling Moore a pedophile: any exaggerations or missteps on the part of righteous progressives can be used as fuel to fire up the partisan delusions of ignorant people fed a steady stream of fake news. Just look what happened with the Moore accuser who admitted she’d added a date and location to Roy Moore’s signature in her high school yearbook: that little, left-out detail was all that was needed to brand her a forger, liar, a charlatan, a fake! (Never mind the fact that those two things — her sexual assault by Moore and her adding notes to her yearbook — are in no way mutually exclusive.) For those looking for any excuse to believe Moore, this yearbook revelation has chipped away at the credibility of all his other corroborated accusers.
I appreciate the desire to give Moore some sort of shaming label, his own scarlet letter. Though both terms denote seriously problematic (criminal if acted upon) sexual interests, I’ll admit “hebephilia” just isn’t as catchy — or inflammatory — as “pedophilia.” But if you’re going to call Moore anything, then for the sake of clarity and accuracy, you should probably call him a hebephile. It may not be a recognized paraphilia, but maybe that’s okay — it doesn’t give Moore and his ilk the excuse of a mental disorder. He’s just a manipulative guy who, like so many others, ignored morality/ethics/the law/the will of his vulnerable victims and abused his power to get what he wanted — and who should be held accountable. With the growing awareness of the #MeToo movement, it’s becoming clear (finally!) that an adult targeting teens…or a boss exposing himself to an employee…or a celebrity grabbing someone’s pussy without their consent…is predatory behavior that’s unacceptable, unconscionable, and unforgivable (accept for maybe the citizens of Alabama).
And then there’s also the term “creep.” You can certainly call Roy Moore a racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic creep unworthy to serve in U.S. Senate. I won’t begrudge you that.
The Power by Naomi Alderman, which won the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction earlier this year in England, has already been hailed as “our era’s ‘Handmaid’s Tale,'” it’s that good. The novel imagines women suddenly having the ability, thanks to environmental pollutants, to emit from their hands electrical charges of varying degrees — from prickly little tickles to fatal blows. The book asks and answers in clever, page-turning prose, What happens when the gender power structure gets flipped upside-down, when women possess the ability to control men with not only the threat of violence, but the free exercise of it?
Alderman unfolds the societal transformation slowly and subtly, following a set of characters from different corners of the world as they push — and keep pushing — the limits of their newfound power and resulting freedom. In one early scene, a woman, who’s been rioting in the streets of Riyadh with her female compatriots, takes the hand of a young, up-and-coming male journalist embedded with the mob and leads him up to an empty apartment:
…she takes off his jacket, pulls the shirt over his head. She looks at his body as she did before: open and hungry. She kisses him.
…She puts her palm to his chest. “I am a free woman,” she says.
…She unbuttons his jeans and he steps out of them; she goes carefully; he can feel her skein starting to hum. He is afraid, he is turned on; it is all bundled up together, as it is in his fantasies.
“You are a good man,” she says. “You are beautiful.”
She runs the back of her hand over the sparse fur of his chest. She lets a tiny crackle go, a prickle at his hair’s ends, glowing faintly. It feels good. Every line of his body is coming into focus as she touches him, as if he hand’t really been there at all, before.
He wants to be inside her; his body is already telling him what to do, how to move this thing forward, how to take her arms, how to bring her down on to the bed, how to consummate. But the body has contradictory impulses: fear is as significant as lust, physical pain as strong as desire. He holds himself there, wanting and not-wanting. He lets her set the pace.
It takes a long while, and it is good. She shows him what to do, with his mouth and with his fingers. By the time she is riding him, sweating and calling out, the sun has risen on a new day in Riyadh. And when she loses control as she finishes she sends a jolt through his buttocks and across his pelvis and he barely feels the pain at all, so great is the delight.
In most “realistic” novels, these roles would be reversed: the man would make the first move, lead the way, and start the undressing, while the woman would be nervous but sexually awakened and even defined by the man’s first touch. Here, it is she who seduces him, tells him he’s beautiful, shows him what to do, rides on top in the power position, and — perhaps most strikingly — has a climactic orgasm that ends the scene. There is no thought or attention given, by either the female character or the author, to the man’s own orgasm, as if the honor of just being a part of her pleasure should be enough. Sound familiar?
Do yourself a favor and read The Power, both for the heavy philosophical questions it raises and for the sheer fun of it. You’ll be struck by the perfect timing of this book, hitting the States just as we as a culture are finally grappling openly and honestly with the vast sexual abuses of men in power.
As one of Alderman’s character’s asks, “Why did they do it?” Another answers, “Because they could.”
Chances are you’ll have to spend the holidays with a few family members who voted for the human candied yam. You could always just cancel holiday plans all together, hole up in your house, and binge watch some light fare like “The Walking Dead.” But if for some reason you’d like to remain on speaking terms with the relatives who pooped on the concept of peace on earth, while also staying true to yourself, here are 10 super sarcastic, passive-aggressive things you can do during Xmas dinner — just to make a political point without actually talking politics — that will take you right up to, but hopefully not over, the edge of being disowned:
1. When taking a poll on whether the potatoes should be mashed or whipped, go with the method with the least votes. When people complain, say, “Oh, did you want me to go with the popular vote? Because this is America — that’s not how things work here.”
2. If the turkey is impressive, praise it loudly as “a total 10.”
3. When the oven reaches its optimal temperature for cooking the turkey, insist that it’s not warm enough. When someone points out the digital temperature reading, explain how that’s a hoax and it’s really not that hot.
4. When you have to go to the bathroom after your fifth cocktail, ask your hosts to remind you where it is. When they point you in the direction of the one down the hall, explain that you’re not comfortable using a gender-neutral restroom.
5. When preparing to carve the turkey, pronounce, “I’m gonnagrab this bird by the pussy.” Bonus points if children are seated at the table.
6. When plating people, offer only slices of breast to those who voted for Trump. If they request any dark meat, say, “Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you only liked whites…I mean, white.”
7. During dinner, pile an enormous amount of potatoes on your plate and start sculpting it, à la Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. When someone asks what you’re doing, explain that you’re building a wall to keep the gravy out.
8. When someone asks you to pass the cranberry sauce, say “Cranberry sauce goes against my religion.” Then promptly get up with the sauce in hand and dump it in the trash.
9. After the dessert and coffee have been served, offer everyone an after-dinner mint: a Tic Tac.
10. When it’s your turn to share what you’re thankful for, just start openly sobbing.
A lot of strides have been made in educating people, especially college students, about consent. Many now understand you have to ask for it throughout a hookup, it must be given enthusiastically and verbally as you go, it can’t be given by people impaired by drugs or alcohol, and it can’t be given by minors. Consent (or the lack-thereof) is now the crux of many sexual abuse cases. And news anchors and pundits are comfortable with the word, using it often, when only just a few years ago it was barely in the lexicon. That’s progress.
So in the wake of the recent Louis C.K. revelations, it’s not surprising there’s been a lot of talk about how he forced these women into “non-consensual” sexual scenarios. Refinery29 slightly misrepresented the facts Friday, stating that “Five different women have described how C.K. masturbated in front of them without their consent.” I’ve heard writers and friends claim unequivocally, “Everything he did is illegal.” Another asserted, “Only one woman didn’t say no. The rest did and he went ahead and did it.” Both the feminist writer Jessica Valenti and Elle.com challenged men for having the gall to even ask: Is what he did illegal?
But if you read the New York Times article carefully, what we learn may not be as cut and dried as we’d like:
– He asked two women in his hotel room if he could masturbate in front of them, they “laughed it off,” thinking it was a joke. (A 2012 Gawker piece about the incident asserts that “the women gave a facetious thumbs up.”) Then he actually did it.
– He asked another woman while walking to a set together if she would come back to his trailer and watch him masturbate. She said no. He didn’t do it.
– He asked a fourth woman to watch him masturbate in his office, she said yes and he did it.
– While on the phone with a fifth woman, he didn’t explicitly ask her; he just started speaking about his sexual fantasies and began masturbating during their conversation, which was essentially a business call.
Except in the egregious case of the phone call (which he conveniently left out of his self-serving “apology”), he technically asked for consent and only masturbated when he got it. That call alone should make him a pariah. All, of course, are indisputably reprehensible. But in the other cases, a strong defense could be made that consent was asked for and received, and thus the defendant didn’t realize he was “causing affront or alarm” (essential to most state’s legal definitions of indecent exposure). All this makes the question “Is what he did illegal?” — whether asked by a woman or a man — legitimate.
The usual foes of feminism have used these details to decry what they perceive as a man-hating witch hunt by the sex police: He asked for consent and they gave it — men aren’t mind readers! Women also have a responsibility to get up, walk out and call out out this behavior — these women weren’t shackled! These days, you’re not allowed to rely on reading body language and even an unwanted kiss is considered sexual assault — what kind of damage is this doing to young men’s self-esteem?
Leaving aside the possibility that perhaps too much self-esteem is what contributes to some men thinking it’s okay to jerk off in front of professional peers and underlings, let’s consider consent in the context of a world where sexism, misogyny and discrimination are still alive and well: where 90% of adult rape victims are female (17 million since 1998, which is almost a million per year); where 85% of domestic abuse victims are female; where sexual assault against women in the military is rampant but its insular justice system more often results in retaliation and resignation, rather than positive results for victims; where some in the federal government are actively rolling back women’s rights over their own bodies; and where women are profoundly under-represented in high-powered positions – and not by choice.
How, then, in this world, does consent really work when a titan in your industry of choice can make or break your career? When you are a young up-and-comer and your powerful boss is 20 years older? When you’re broke and he can hire an entire law firm to crush you if you come forward? Consent is a valuable — indeed necessary — part of respectful sexual encounters, but as we see here, it doesn’t always work like it should: sadly, it may be “given” without conviction, under duress, out of fear.
This case, like so many others, is an undeniable abuse of power, a calculated exploitation of a power differential. I strongly suspect Louis C.K. knew what he was doing: using his requests for consent as a loophole; only targeting the young and the powerless in his industry; relying on his brutally honest brand of crude humor that’s widely popular as an excuse, as cover; knowing full well that he was causing an affront and alarm (hence his private apologies to some of the women well before the Times story).
But can abuses of power like this be made criminal? They should be, but probably can’t be, at least not easily and maybe not without significantly infringing on people’s freedoms, as is the case with trying to legally bar hate speech. Imagine laws against sexual overtures being made to, say, anyone three or more years younger than you, or anyone making $20K or more less than you…or outlawing office romances altogether. Truly consensual, equitable relationships happen all the time at work, even among bosses and their employees. Lines can and should be drawn. A friend of mine was sexually harassed whilst at work. It was a very traumatic time for her but due to the amazing help that an employment attorney in Colorado provided, she got through it! She even managed to get some compensation which is the least she deserved in my opinion! Although healthy workplace relationships can happen, you still need to be careful.
If courts of law can’t do it (at least not until we reach a tipping point in political will, and considering the gun control debate, I’m not hopeful), then the courts of public opinion must. (Again, just like with hate speech.) It’s frustrating to watch people debate the concealed carry california policy. If you are not aware, a concealed carry weapon is a gun law policy that allows individuals to carry a concealed firearm in public places after completing CCWL training requirements. The concealed carry is one of the many gun control policies that are in the for and against discussion.
It’s heartening to see social pressure working in real time: C.K.’s new movie is not being released, FX has cut ties with him, his management company dropped his as a client, his publicist quit, Netflix cancelled production of his forthcoming special, and HBO has pulled all past specials.
In this case, a civil rather than criminal suit would probably be the best course of action (if not, due to statutes of limitation, the only course of action) — and hopefully a good prosecutor could destroy C.K.’s shady “I got consent” defense, establishing decent precedent. Better rules from human resource departments and explicit clauses in contracts regarding sexual (mis)conduct should be implemented. (Using Claire from HR’s Sexual Harassment Quiz in companies across the nation could be a good start!) More generally, women need to be empowered and men need to be encouraged to call out misogyny and abuse wherever and whenever they appear. A no-tolerance policy, a willingness to speak up, and subsequent public shaming — a wave of which we’re seeing now — has to become the rule, not the exception.
One of the best ways to achieve that is with better sex education, from both parents and schools. And it needs to start young. Sexual harassment training in the workplace is a noble endeavor, but the studies done so far on these courses suggest they may not be very effective and, in some cases, may even backfire – by adulthood, it could be too late. Respect and justice need to be baked into the sex-ed cake from the start (see Cory Silverberg’s excellent book for kids, Sex Is a Funny Word). Boys need to learn to wield their power responsibly; girls need to learn they have power. And consent needs to be taught as more than just a technicality of sex, but as a guiding principal based on an overriding consideration for all potential sex partners.
Which is not to say you can’t like it dirty, you just can’t be a predatory douche about it like Louis C.K.
This past weekend, over takeout and then later texts, some friends and I were discussing the Louis C.K. allegations. (Talking about sexual misconduct, assault and rape has become regular cocktail party conversation these days, which is a good thing.) One friend shared the following social media post by the writer Emily Bracken:
As a feminist sex writer myself, I’m as outraged by these allegations as the next sentient woman and I desperately implore victims of rape to seek legal action against the evil men responsible for it. If you need help from an excellent personal injury lawyer, this Brisbane firm is highly-recommended. Moreover, I’m inspired by the wave of survivors speaking out publicly. And I’m gratified by the overwhelming (albeit incomplete) public response of women finally being believed and their perpetrators being shamed and ousted. I totally get the clever “passive-aggressive rape” sentiment: C.K. used his position to force unwilling participants into a sexual scenario without any physical contact. My initial reaction was to give it a thumbs-up.
But ultimately, I don’t think we should be conflating what C.K. did – gross sexual misconduct, harassment, indecent exposure – with forced bodily penetration.
In an effort to get out of my liberal bubble, I sometimes read more moderate, libertarian, and even conservative online forums. And time and again, I’ve seen fairly thoughtful, well educated people — people who are interested in intelligent philosophical debates on politics and religion — become apoplectic over earnest Internet memes like “Stop eye raping me!” Much to my dismay and chagrin, they take the letter of these feminist memes (the thought police are one step away from instituting blinders for all men), instead of the spirit (women don’t like to be ogled and harassed). Viral tag lines specifically designed to provoke and challenge often have the opposite effect of alienating exactly those moderates we need on our side to elect progressive politicians and pass legislation that ensures women’s equality (or at the very least, to not elect more Donald Trumps and Roy Moores).
So I sometimes worry that declarations like these, which blur lines for dramatic effect, only help convince these people to reject all feminist critiques as extreme and unreasonable.
Feminist writer Jessica Valenti wrote recently, “I’ve heard male friends express relief that C.K. wasn’t accused of rape; as if on the spectrum of harassment and assault, what he did wasn’t as horrific as other kinds of assault.” It was horrific, to be sure, but let’s be honest: it wasn’t ashorrific as, say, Weinstein’s alleged rapes. Yes, both are horrendous abuses of power which should absolutely be prosecuted, both in a court of law and the court of public opinion: but one is a misdemeanor, the other is a felony. You wouldn’t wish either to happen to anyone, but in a twisted game of “Would You Rather,” nobody is picking Weinstein over C.K.
What the comedian did was definitely a product of society’s vast “rape culture,” but it wasn’t rape. All the crimes being revealed of late are bad, but they’re not equally bad. Admitting that doesn’t diminish our moral authority, nor does it absolve any of these criminals. Maybe calling everything “rape” is what it’s going to take to shame and scare men out of all sexual misconduct, from catcalling to sexual harassment to acquaintance rape. But in doing so, I fear we only feed the inevitable backlash against the progress of the last few months – which Valenti herself prophesizes.
Just look at what happened with the well-meaning but inaccurate “1 in 4 college women will be sexually assaulted” meme: critics ripped it apart, citing it as yet another example of irrational, unreasonable harpies with their hair (and pants) on fire crying wolf, despite all the evidence that there is a serious wolf epidemic. This is how we end up with Betsy DeVos reversing Obama-era policy on campus sexual assault investigations.
While we continue the fight to bring sexual harassment, misconduct, assault and rape out of the shadows and into the light — with shame only for the predators, not the victims — it’s important to speak accurately about the facts of each case, avoid generalizations, and acknowledge nuance. Let’s not give those less sympathetic to the feminist cause any reason to dismiss these kinds of charges as unbelievable, statistics about assault as exaggerated, or our justified outrage over them as misguided. That will go a long way in preserving the goodwill brave women coming forward have right now, helping to ensure this wave of justice becomes not just a trend but the norm.
We don’t want special treatment, just equality and justice.
On October 19th, 2017, Chief of Staff John Kelly gave a fiercely personal defense of President Trump’s failed attempt at a sympathetic call to the grieving widow of one of the four soldiers recently killed in the Niger ambush. Having lost his own son to combat, Kelly explained with contained emotion, “There’s nothing you can do to lighten the burden on these families.” And then, while rueing the politicization of Gold Star families, he recalled a bygone era when certain things were considered sacred and off-limits:
You know, when I was a kid growing up, a lot of things were sacred in our country. Women were sacred, looked upon with great honor. That’s obviously not the case anymore as we see from recent cases.
The sentiment is honorable: women shouldn’t be sexually harassed or assaulted. No one can argue with that. But his statement belies the historical reality of the systemic oppression and abuse of women since this country’s inception. Just look at this chart of data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics:
Pretending — or at least wishfully thinking — that there was a previous golden era of respect towards women mimics the flawed thinking behind the “Make America Great Again” tagline. Not only does it sugar-coat the past, but it pines for a day when:
women weren’t granted access to safe and legal abortions
birth control was inaccessible or even illegal
people, companies and institutions could legally discriminate on the basis of sex
husbands could legally rape their wives
The other problem with Kelly’s well-intentioned but nevertheless irksome statement is its benevolent chauvinism, a patronizing form of the casual sexism that is alive and well in this country (as I’ve recently written). Similarly, Joe Scarborough let a sliver of his own benevolent sexism show this past week on Morning Joe (watch the clip at minute 7:00) when he lauded the South’s emphasis on politesse while criticizing Trump’s lack of sensitivity and decorum:
My parents at times would say, “That is not how a Southern gentleman treats a lady! Open the door, walk behind, do this, carry that….”
Let’s put aside the facts that the South does not have a lower rate of reported rapes than the rest of the country and it does have the highest rates of domestic homicide. What Kelly and Scarborough have done here with their seemingly respectful statements is to put women on a pedestal and imbue them with divine qualities. Unfortunately, this paints women as something “other,” a separate species from men requiring special (read: condescending) treatment.
But women don’t need special treatment, we need true equality. And we won’t get it until the Men-Are-From-Mars… crowd stops obsessing over the minor differences between the sexes and starts acknowledging their vastly overlapping common humanity.
Some combination of personality flaw/disorder, power high, and celebrity allowed Harvey Weinstein (and Donald Trump and Bill Cosby and Bill O’Reilly…) to allegedly sexually harass and assault many women for many years with impunity and without remorse. But there’s another factor at work in these cases — one that’s insidious, pervasive and widely permissible: casual sexism.
Yes, it’s gotten a hell of a lot better over the past few decades — watch any episode of “Mad Men” or “The Deuce” for proof that blatant misogyny has taken a big hit. But casual sexism still remains one the last few socially acceptable prejudices — one that won’t automatically get you fired from a job or prevent you from becoming president of the United States. Read the Google memo. Watch the clip of Ben Affleck grabbing Hilarie Burton’s breast on live television. Read the texts between Representative Tim Murphy and his mistress about him encouraging her to get an abortion while he promoted harsh, anti-choice legislation. And you’ll know that women’s minds and bodies are still, in the 21st century, constantly judged, belittled and controlled.
But even these examples are more obvious than the millions of little messages we as a society are bombarded with every day which suggest, in almost a whisper, that women are less than men: less competent, less qualified, less emotionally stable, less funny, less entitled to sexual pleasure, less human. They’re in the little digs which roll of the tongue effortlessly and then roll off the backs of women who’ve learned to be accommodating and uncritical for reasons of self-preservation. They’re in all the times parents and teachers segregate the sexes, creating cootie-fueled animosity between them, which gets exploited by the ones who grow up with more power: the boys. They’re in every instance of Bill Maher still thinking it’s okay to use the sexually judgmental word “bimbo” to criticize a female politician for bad policy.
Let me unpack another specific example of this kind of casual sexism that’s so easy to miss, but so cumulatively toxic. I was flipping through the latest Rolling Stone the other day and stumbled upon an interview with Marilyn Manson, the goth cult icon who impressively eschewed machismo and embraced gender fluidity with his heavy makeup and nipple-free breast “implants.” Some of his less impressive stunts — for example, women led around on leashes during his stage shows — should have prepared me for the possibility of an unenlightened off-the-cuff remark, but the following lines still stopped me in my tracks:
. . . I lost my virginity [in Canton, Ohio], and got crabs at the same time. . . . Who in 10th grade has crabs? I guess that unfortunate, slutty cheerleader in Canton, Ohio.
There is so much subtext in his use of the word “slutty.” Those six little letters do a lot of work. The term suggests all of the following:
a 10th grade girl who has sex is a slut (“slut” being defined here as a shamefully promiscuous, dirty loser)
having sex as few as two times (once to get crabs and once to deflower Marilyn Manson) is enough to qualify a girl as a slut
as a man, losing one’s virginity to a young woman is not an experience that should be treated with respect and reverence, whether in the moment or in the memory of it
sex is not a mutual exchange of pleasure between people who respect each other, but rather a farcical transaction whereby the man gets/takes something (in this case, experience and an STD) from the woman whom he may not respect or even particularly like
Some, I’m sure, would argue that I’m reading too much into this, putting words into Manson’s mouth which he didn’t actually say. Hey, perhaps he would call himself a slut, too! But the combination of him choosing that word in the first place and the editors then choosing to present his quote without further explanation or elaboration (along with the eight other double standards I read/watched/witnessed that day) make it impossible not to hear all those interpretations. The only difference is whether you receive them consciously or subconsciously.
If you subscribe to the radical notion that women should be treated equally and fairly, then you’ll get those messages loud and clear — and you’ll be annoyed by them (and by the sheer, exhausting number of them). But if you think uppity women need to relax, and female killjoys like me need to get a sense of humor, and wives like Melania (and Michelle…and Hillary…) should be seen and not heard, then you’re still getting those messages, only subconsciously. And rather than annoying you, they’re giving you sweeping societal permission, like a devil on your shoulder, to demean, dehumanize and, in extreme cases, even abuse women. It starts with a little “harmless” slut-shaming and ends with 17 million American women getting raped over the past 20 years.
The people who take in these messages of casual sexism and then regurgitate them without realizing their impact are the same people who ignored the crimes going on in those hotel rooms, the people who aided and abetted them, and the people who committed them.
Many people went batshit last week when Melania Trump wore stilettos on not one, but two separate visits to Hurricane Harvey devastation last week (though, to be clear, she changed into sneaks on the plane rides there). I (Lo) was intrigued by Rhonda Garelick’s think piece “Melania Trump and the Chilling Artifice of Fashion” in The Cut, which argued that the problem here is “that this administration turns every event — no matter how dire — into a kind of anesthetized luxury fashion shoot, which leads us to some disturbing political truths.”
And so I shared it on my personal Facebook page, tagging my husband with the phrase “Fashion Weak” (he falls squarely in the camp of Anne Hathaway in the first half of The Devil Wears Prada). It sparked the following discussion, which the participants have given me permission to post here:
TALAL: I’m surprised that a feminist would post such a sexist article, especially considering one of your main political role models was always critiqued for her pant suits.
And the bs premise that this article is based on, is even worse. First off any woman should be free to wear whatever she wants without being critiqued for it for ANY reason… Because not even women (evidently) should decide what is appropriate attire for another woman.
The second premise of this article is that she isn’t confirming to social norms. Again shouldn’t that be her choice? I’m sure seasoned politicians would have their advisors tell them exactly what to wear, exactly how to act, what baby to kiss, etc… At least her cluelessness is genuine not manufactured by what some career political advisor has based off focus groups and opinion polls.
What i DON’T see feminists doing is supporting Melania who obviously DOESN’T want this position or the responsibility that comes with it but that has been dragged into it by a MAN who happened to become elected to whom she has to be subservient in the public eye because she is now FLOTUS.
AMERICAN GUY FRIEND:
LO: Talal, I can see how criticizing her clothes can seem problematic. I really hated that meme with the stodgy pictures of recent first ladies juxtaposed with Melania’s nude photos — it was an effort to denigrate Donald by slut shaming Melania. Unjust and irrelevant. And obviously what someone wears should not invite sexual harassment or assault.
But I don’t think it’s necessarily un-feminist to critique stilettos. In fact, one could easily make a feminist argument against stilettos. After all, their impracticality and health risks (nail damage, bunions, knee & hip pain, osteoarthritis, muscle pain & spasms) literally handicap women, though there are solutions to the pain. Without wanting to slut shame anyone, I can still, as a feminist, have a serious problem with the obligatory sexual objectification of women and the staggering imbalance between male and female nudity in pop culture. And I can certainly make a feminist case against the burqa. Critiquing clothes (or the lack thereof) isn’t necessarily off limits for feminists.
So combine the impracticality of Melania’s hurricane-victim ensemble with its tone-deafness, and I can totally understand the eye rolls — even as a feminist.
But this article is not arguing that the problem is that she wore an unsuitable, blithely out-of-touch outfit. It’s that this administration and its relationship to America’s citizens is “as dissociative as a fashion advertisement, brought to power by manipulating and rechanneling the electorate’s desires for wealth and possessions.” Trump and his brand (which includes his family) are a soulless, meaningless corporate black hole intent on increasing their own wealth by using fear, lies and aspirational carrot-dangling to secure brand loyalty.
IF ONLY some seasoned political advisors could convince Trump and his ilk how to act, speak and dress! Maybe then our standing in the world wouldn’t be going quite so far down the toilet.
As far as feminists not supporting Melania goes, I’ve seen plenty of public sympathy for her as someone who’s the victim of an extreme narcissist, someone who might even suffer from Stockholm syndrome or battered wife syndrome (at least of the emotional abuse variety). I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump has certain rules he enforces about how she looks and what she wears. So when you speak of her “choice” in these matters, I’m not totally convinced she has any.
Btw, why exactly does she have to be subservient to Trump in public because she’s FLOTUS? I don’t think anyone would describe Michelle Obama as “subservient” to Barack during his administration. I’d happily praise Melania for genuineness. Just let it be for standing up to her psycho husband, not for wearing heels to a hurricane.
TALAL: The US’ horrible standing in the world started a little before Trump… And she’s subservient to Trump… Umm because he’s a chauvinistic egomaniac.
KERRY NEVILLE (author of the forthcoming “Remember to Forget Me”): Lo, yes, to all that. Melania may suffer at the hands of a narcissistic husband, but she is also an adult woman, a mother, and she lost my sympathy with her public, independent support of Trump’s birther claims, with her empty anti-bullying online platform. She is also not a woman without resources and could leave that marriage, though I don’t know the details of her prenup. I do know many many women without her resources who left very very abusive marriages to narcs, who left with just the clothes on their backs and kids in hand, but who spoke up and refused to be victims. She has obviously made her deal with the devil and gets something in return that is worth her subservience.
LO: Ha! I knew you’d go there, Talal. You’ll notice I didn’t say anything like “We were #1!” We can debate whether the US’s reputation was already in the the toilet or just in the bathroom another time. But I’m sure we can agree that Trump has done absolutely nothing to help it.
As for your subservient point, I think I misread it slightly originally. You were saying she’s always had to be subservient but now she has to do it in public, where she never wanted to be, right? I’d disagree — like Kerry suggests above, she’s a grown woman who knew what she was getting into when she married Trump; it obviously wasn’t for love or lust, but for his money and, yes, the media attention that clearly comes along with him (president or not). I have some sympathy for her (my god, she’s married to HIM! The horror, the horror…), but it only goes so far.
LO’s SISTER-IN-LAW: I’m with Trevor Noah on this one. I’m looking forward to a day when what a woman wears is not a news item. And I believe if we liked or approved of Melania or her husband we wouldn’t see her outfit in that way. When you dislike someone so much already, it’s impossible to view anything about them in a positive or even a neutral light. Everything looks sinister or heartless. Mostly I just don’t care what they wear. Except I think it’s shitty they are promoting Trump campaign swag (the hats). That’s different because that’s using these photo shoots to sell merch.
LO’s HUBBY: If the mayor of Houston showed up to a flood-ravaged neighborhood in slippers it would make the news. The stilettos indicate how out of touch the Trumps are.
What a critique of a summer superhero blockbuster might look like in a matriarchal world (inspired by David Edelstein’s sexist review of Wonder Woman):
The only grace note in the generally clunky Spider-Man: Homecoming is its star, the five-foot-eight-inch, barely legal, English actor and dancer Tom Holland, who is the perfect blend of teenage day-dreaminess and balls. The 21-year-old plays Peter Parker, a male super-hero with arachnid powers. He’s also a total nerd — we’re talking full-on dweeb, one that rivals Anthony Michael Hall’s Farmer Ted in Sixteen Candles — yet this somehow doesn’t diminish his appeal, sexual or otherwise. The movie chronicles, with surprising seriousness, his attempt to balance the challenges of high school life with saving the world from the dastardly plans of family-man-gone-wrong, Vulture (played by ex-Batman Michael Keaton, looking a little leathery around the eyes). Homecoming is the story of how Peter learns a lesson of moral courage, one that won’t be big news to you, since you’ve probably seen all five — count ‘em, five! — self-indulgent Spider-Man movies made in just the last 15 years.
Holland didn’t wow me in his debut in The Impossible, playing a pubescent Brit caught in the 2004 Thailand tsunami who’s forced to see his mother’s bare boob in the wreckage. He seemed embarrassed and stiff (and not in a good way!). Here, he’s a treat though, with his adorable attempt at an American accent delivered quite courageously. (All British dudes, even when they’re suppressing their mother tongue, are hot, which I say with neither shame nor hesitation.) In some scenes, Holland’s Parker pauses mid-dialogue and his miraculously clear teen skin wrinkles and contorts — he’s thinking deep thoughts. Why do adults kill the innocent? Where is Vulture? What am I going to wear to prom?
While this Spider-Man is still into bondage (Peter’s web-shooters catch bad guys and the hearts of movie goers), some fans who cannot appreciate the elfin magic of young, lithe dancers might be disappointed that Peter Parker is still in his awkward phase. With a male director, Jon Watts, at the helm, Spider-Man isn’t even photographed to elicit slobbers. Slobbering, red-blooded, American patriots will be even more put out, given that Spider-Man’s crotch-area is never given the loving cinematographic attention it deserves. I didn’t miss Nicholas Hammond’s adult yet soft and ill-defined body from the 1970’s TV show, though. Holland is still a hottie, albeit with a small “h.”
But you’ll need the patience of a Buddhist monk to wait for this taut, young Spider-Man to appear in costume. After a humdrum science experimentation montage that defies all logic and laws of physics (not to mention, devotes way too much time to the minutia of male teen friendship based on mutual virginity), the movie begins to shake off its cobwebs. It’s a fish-out-of-water set-up — Peter is a sort of merman with no idea how to fight like the big guys in the big bad world or how to talk to female authority figures in high school. He looks cute in his obligatory AP Chem outfit with the faded tee and hoodie, but it’s not until he slips into his high-tech bodysuit that hugs him in all the right places and leaps into the fray, that he comes into his own. (Upon the big reveal, my heart did about five somersaults.)
Alas, much of his fighting is computer-enhanced, and there’s way too much of the Tarzan-swinging that got old at about the time of this century’s third Spider-Man movie. Watts lacks the artistic aesthetic of female visionaries, and the battles are a hash. Give me the brute strength and otherworldly power of Amazon-trained, modern god Diana Prince any day. As precious as Spider-Man is, he’s no Wonder Woman.
The gushing reviews of Spiderman: Homecoming suggest that people are grading on a big curve to protect the delicate feelings of comic book fanatics still living in their parents’ basements, but I’ll admit this gratuitous retelling of the boy-bug-wonder’s story is preferable to yet another installment in the X-Men series. It may be worth mentioning that I didn’t see this Spider-Man in 3-D, which might have made a difference (especially in the crotch department).
The climax did send me out happy. At regular intervals in the epic battle between Spider-Man and Vulture, Watts cuts to long-shots of Tom Holland’s silhouette against the red-and-gold sky. His body looks like an early Michelangelo, flexed and pulsing with a sense of purpose. He’s both boy and man. Despite my reservations, I fell for this alluring paradox. If loving him is wrong, I don’t want to be right.
Our family recently adopted two kittens. We had our pick of the litter, so we figured we’d get a girl and a boy, just like our two kids. They decided to name the girl Rey and the boy Po. (Star Wars fans relax: for whatever reason — let’s call it artistic license — they insisted on dropping the “e.”)
Rey, we quickly learned, is cautious, while Po is more carefree. He’s the first to attack the crinkle toy while Rey hangs back, waiting to make her move. She’ll cuddle, but only on her own terms – try to pick her up and she’ll wriggle away. When we first got her, she was extremely anxious and I was so worried about her! I looked up what the pet CBD dosage was and decided to see if some CBD oil might make her relax a bit. It worked really well but I think her personality is definitely more reserved anyway. She’s certainly not a confident cat!! Meanwhile, Po loves to be pet – you can scoop him up, rub his belly, scratch his chin. And he’s hyper! Always instigating the play-fighting with his sister. There have been a few times when I’ve wondered if the poundings he’s given Rey with his hind legs have been a little too rough. You know, not a fair fight.
But then last week we took them to get their booster shots and guess what? Po, it turns out, is a girl.
What a surprise! We’d have to rethink their whole sibling relationship! We’d have to rename him! We’d have to retrain ourselves not to call her a “him!”. It would probably be a wise idea for us to change her diet considering she won’t be needing to eat as much! Well I guess that’s me not having to get as many wholesale pet treats for Po now, which is lucky, we could have made her a very fat cat!
But after the initial shock of how we (and the vet tech) could get it so wrong wore off, I asked myself, “Why? Why do we have to do any of these things?”
When we broke the news to our 9-year-old daughter, she immediately, much to my chagrin, started interacting with Po differently — using a higher voice, petting her more gently, being more protective of her. She insisted that we change Po’s name. Okay, so the name she lobbied hard for was “Charlie,” but to her, the discovery that this cat had different reproductive organs than we’d previously thought meant the cat needed a brand new identity.
My husband admitted that, before the vet visit, he’d chalked up their personality differences to innate gender differences, even though when we first brought the kittens home he had to “train” himself to refer to Po as a “he” because both cats were equally adorable (which, of course, reveals another bias: that cute and petite automatically mean feminine). I myself – an outspoken opponent of gender stereotyping – assumed Po might kick Rey’s ass, even though they’re equally sized and equally frisky (at least once the kitty death matches commence).
I consider our adventures in feline gender assignment the perfect example of how we as a society automatically (and often against evidence) treat human boys and girls, men and women, so differently. We place them in separate, narrowly defined boxes, when really we all exist in vastly overlapping spheres. Our similarities greatly outweigh our differences, especially as children, before a lifetime of pink and blue nurturing can impact our cerebral nature.
I tried explaining this to my kids. “Doesn’t this just go to show that you shouldn’t treat someone differently simply because they’re a girl or a boy? Cats are cats, and humans and humans – you should befriend them and play with them and treat them kindly no matter what happens to be between their legs.” My eldest rolled her eyes. My 6-year-old asked if he could watch TV.
(Before anyone is tempted to ascribe these different reactions to innate gender differences, it should be noted that both our kids would mainline Netflix if they could. My eldest is just getting to that pre-pubescent age when any parentsplaining is automatically met — at least outwardly — with annoyance and dismissal.)
Developmental psychologist Christia Spears Brown’s excellent book Parenting Beyond Pink and Blue lists countless studies and meta-analyses that show how gender bias – so insidious and pervasive — is detrimental not just for girls, but for everyone. A few every day examples: girls don’t excel in math and science like they could and they develop serious body image issues (thanks, Barbie!); boys do worse academically because they’ve been shamed against asking for help and dads who don’t do the “mom stuff” find parenthood less satisfying. Like I’ve written before, being encouraged to try and allowed to enjoy a variety of different experiences as you grow up, regardless of whether those experiences are deemed “masculine” or “feminine,” creates better brains – not to mention more empathic humans. Gender-blind parenting, writes Spears, “is about enabling your children to maintain as many cognitive, social, and emotional abilities as possible.”
Even our progressive promotion of trans rights – a positive, necessary social advancement, to be sure – can sometimes, ironically, betray our gender biases. In her recent New York Times op-ed, “My Daughter Is Not Trans. She’s a Tomboy,” Lisa Selin Davis writes of her sporty, track-panted, shaggy haired kid:
…when [her pediatrician, teachers, people who have know her for many years] continue to question her gender identity – and are skeptical of her response [that she’s a girl] – the message they send is that a girl cannot look and act like her and still be a girl.
She is not gender nonconforming. She is gender role nonconforming. She does not fit into the mold that we adults – who have increasingly eschewed millenniums-old gender roles ourselves, as women work outside the home and men participate in the domestic sphere – still impose upon our children.
…Somehow, as we have broadened our awareness of and support for gender nonconformity, we’ve narrowed what we think a boy or a girl can look like and do.
The automatic and apparently common assumption that her daughter must be a boy just for rejecting traditional gender stereotypes reflects our society’s narrow -minded (and often sexist) assumption that there’s only one way to be female (sugar & spice et al.) and one way to be male (snips & snails). We would be much better off — in terms of equality and acceptance of diversity — if we embraced the fact that there are a lot of ways to exist (behave/dress/talk/work) in the world, regardless of gender identity. Remember the story of the trans man who gave birth and breast fed his baby?!
I pushed hard against renaming Po, explaining to my kids, “We’ve had Po for 2 months now. She’s Po to me. That’s a girl’s name if we say it is. Why should we change it when she’s still the exact same cat we’ve grown to love and consider part of the family?”
I’m happy to report that, as of right now, the kittens are still called “Rey” and “Po.” I wish I could chalk this up to my exceptional parental communication of feminist philosophical values, but I’m pretty sure my eldest only dropped her new moniker campaign after I pulled up a baby name website and pointed out the little pink icon next to the word “Po.”
Last night on Survivor, during a desperate attempt to throw a fellow competitor under the bus to save his own skin at tribal council, Jeff Varner outed Zeke Smith as a transgender man — seemingly forgetting that it wasn’t just six other players cut off from society who’d hear the news, but potentially millions. Zeke had played this season and a previous one without mentioning his transition, hoping not to be the first “trans Survivor player” but simply “Zeke the Survivor player.”
For any transgender person or trans ally (as Varner stupefyingly claimed he was), the scene was a horrifying and devastating moment. Varner argued he was simply exposing the deception Smith was capable of in this game, assuming that everyone in Zeke’s world back home already knew (never mind all of America!). But as a gay man himself who should have definitely known better, Varner robbed Zeke of his right to privacy, his right to tell his own story in the manner he wished. Varner continued to defend himself, with growing hesitation, explaining that a million dollars was on the line. But a million dollars is chump change when it comes to selling your soul.
It shouldn’t have happened. Perhaps Survivor shouldn’t have even aired the exchange. They certainly could have handled it a little more responsibly, partnering with an LGBTQ support organization and at least offering a url or 1–800 number for those seeking help or more information. But since they did air it and millions of viewers saw it (you can watch an incomplete clip below), it’s worth noting — and celebrating — that the unified reaction of all the other players at tribal council and host Jeff Probst embodied a growing public discussion with and acceptance of the LGBTQ community by mainstream, cis-gender America.
Every person there immediately and without hesitation condemned Varner’s verbal diarrhea and expressed an outpouring of support for Smith. They shouted Varner down, shaming his lack of judgment. Some started crying, so disturbed by this injustice against their fellow competitor and friend. One by one, they articulated to the country with one voice how to treat transgender people with dignity and respect:
A stone-faced Ozzy said:
Jeff, you should be ashamed of yourself. You should be ashamed of yourself for what you’re willing to do to get yourself further in a game for a million dollars. It’s like, you’re playing with people’s lives at this point.
Tai, another out gay man, said:
Whenever you want to come out, as a gay person, as transgender, it’s your choice. Nobody should out anybody.
Andrea, who immediately burst into tears at the outing, said:
Just to see someone out somebody else is pretty painful. But I understand that Jeff is feeling very on the outs, and is feeling very desperate, so I do believe that he regrets it. It’s just that, man, that was really tough. I really feel for Zeke. You know, it’s his right to tell people.
Sarah, a midwestern police officer, said choking back tears:
That was a malicious attack, what you [Varner] just did…. I don’t treat people that way…. I’m just thankful that I got to know Zeke for who Zeke is. I’ve been with him for the last 18 days and he’s, like, super kick-ass. You know, I’m from the midwest, I come from a very conservative background, so it’s not very diverse when it comes to a lot of gay and lesbian and transgender and things like that. So I’m not as exposed to it as most of these people are, and the fact that I can love this guy so much, and it doesn’t change anything for me, makes me realize that I’ve grown huge as a person. Of course we want to come away with the million dollars but the metamorphosis that I’ve even made as a person that I didn’t even realize until this minute is invaluable.
And host Probst, both reading the room and making a moral call, said:
Well, I think I know the answer to this question, but: There’s no question who’s going home tonight, right?…We don’t need to vote, just grab your torch.
But the most eloquent reaction, the most dignified, came from Zeke himself, who showed incredible composure and grace under such unnerving circumstances. Rather than lash out in anger (as he had every right to do), Zeke remained divinely composed and thoughtful, embracing the moment as a teachable one:
I think I’m okay. Like, I knew someone might pick up on it or it might be revealed. So, like, I am prepared to talk about it, to have it be part of my Survivor experience. It’s kind of crappy the way it’s happened. But, you know, if “metamorphosis” is the word of the episode [that was the solution to the immunity challenge], I think I’ve seen such a metamorphosis of myself over the past…I think today is day 52 that I’ve played Survivor. And I don’t know the scared kid who hit the mat in the marooning in [season] 33 would be as calm as I am right now, but I’ve started two fires with just bamboo, I’ve won challenges, I’ve been a part of blindsides, I’ve done all kinds of crazy stuff, and I am a changed, stronger, better man today then I was then. So, you know what, Varner it was really not cool, but you know, I’m fine….
I’m certainly not anyone who should be a role model for anybody else. But maybe there’s someone who’s a Survivor fan and me being out on the show helps him or helps her or helps someone else and so maybe this will lead to a greater good.
While Jeff Varner’s actions are deserving of derision and scorn, to his credit he did seem to learn the error of his ways in real time, realizing fairly quickly how royally he had just fucked up, how blinded he’d been by game play, and how cruel he had just been to Zeke. By the end of tribal council, it was Zeke who had to comfort Varner, though of course it should have been the other way around.
In his closing remarks after leaving the tribal council area, Varner said this, ending hunched over in tears:
I don’t even know what I was thinking. It was a horrible move. It was me in this game trying to do everything I possibly could. But nobody on this planet should do what I did tonight. Ever. And I’m so sorry to anyone I offended, especially Zeke, and his family and his friends. I can’t even talk. I’m sorry.
It’s clear that all six players who remained won the evening, in more ways than one.
April 4th is the day Winston starts his diary in 1984.
Like a million other book clubs across the country, mine just (re)read George Orwell’s 1949 dystopian novel, 1984. Its current publisher said sales increased by 10,000 percent after Trump’s inauguration, and it skyrocketed to #1 on Amazon’s bestseller list shortly after his counselor Kellyanne Conway mentioned the administration’s reliance on “alternative facts.” People are returning to the classic for its depiction of a manipulative totalitarian government peddling lies, but they might be sticking with it for the sex.
Yes, 1984 has a lot more sexual themes than you may remember — some of them surprisingly modern; others, not so much.
Written before the sexual revolution and second wave feminism, we can’t be too surprised by lines like “It was Mrs Parsons, the wife of a neighbour on the same floor,” which in one short breath demotes the woman to less-than-neighbor, even though she lives in the same apartment down the hall as her husband. This narrational attitude is not a feature of Orwell’s imagined future, just a reality of the author’s real-world present — a fact which makes other scenes difficult to decipher accurately as purposefully dystopian or just traditionally douchey.
For instance, we learn that one of the government’s aims is to “remove all pleasure from the sexual act,” to “kill the sex instinct, or, if it could not be killed, then to distort it and dirty it”:
It was not merely that the sex instinct created a world of its own which was outside the Party’s control and which therefore had to be destroyed if possible. What was more important was that sexual privation induced hysteria, which was desirable because it could be transformed into war-fever and leader-worship….
“When you make love you’re using up energy; and afterwards you feel happy and don’t give a damn for anything. They can’t bear you to feel like that. They want you to be bursting with energy all the time. All this marching up and down and cheering and waving flags is simply sex gone sour. If you’re happy inside yourself, why should you get excited about Big Brother….?”
So when our protagonist Winston — deprived of loving sex and over-exposed to the orgiastic violence of war his entire life — entertains truly sadisticfantasies about a female coworker named Julia, this may just be evidence of the Party’s success:
Vivid, beautiful hallucinations flashed through his mind. He would flog her to death with a rubber truncheon. He would tie her naked to a stake and shoot her full of arrows like Saint Sebastian. He would ravish her and cut her throat at the moment of climax. Better than before, moreover, he realized why it was that he hated her. He hated her because she was young and pretty and sexless, because he wanted to go to bed with her and would never do so, because round her sweet supple waist, which seemed to ask you to encircle it with your arm, there was only the odious scarlet sash, aggressive symbol of chastity.
But if the Party had truly succeeded, then Winston wouldn’t have had any desire to rail against and resent to begin with. Even if we disregard the disturbing detail of her imagined rape and murder, the above passage still smacks of male entitlement to the female body — not because of but in spite of the Party. Winston hates her because she should be a sexual object but she’s not; he wants to sleep with her but he can’t; her body was practically made for his embrace but he’s not allowed to grab it (the way some modern American presidents do). It seems the problem for Winston here isn’t that the Party promotes rape culture, but that it prevents it. In other words: Winston cannot have what he, as a flesh and blood straight man, is rightfully entitled to. Seventy years later, it’s a misogynistic perspective you can still find on “men’s rights” and “neo-masculinity” sites.
Still, 1984 has shining moments of sexual enlightenment. Much like D.H. Lawrence in his “obscene” 1929 novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Orwell elevates positive sexual interactions as a requirement for human happiness, even human dignity. In a passage that could be describing RedTube, he characterizes the pornography churned out by the government and distributed among the lower classes in order to keep them distracted as “ghastly rubbish,” “boring,” relying on just six plots they simply “swap around a bit.” And in his efforts to argue for the sanctity of (at least hetero) sex — of “a man and a woman with no clothes on, making love when they chose, talking of what they chose, not feeling any compulsion to get up, simply lying there and listening to peaceful sounds outside” — Orwell enthusiastically disperses with some sexist stereotypes. While Winston only dreams of having a secret sexual affair, it is his coworker Julia who pursues him and makes all the arrangements for their trysts. She’s proud of her sexuality, unapologetic about her pleasure. And Winston is not offended or put off by her extensive sexual experience — in fact, quite the opposite:
“Have you done this before?”
“Of course. Hundreds of times—well, scores of times, anyway.”
….
“Listen. The more men you’ve had, the more I love you. Do you understand that?”
“Yes, perfectly.”
….
“You like doing this? I don’t mean simply me: I mean the thing in itself?”
“I adore it.”
That was above all what he wanted to hear. Not merely the love of one person but the animal instinct, the simple undifferentiated desire: that was the force that would tear the Party to pieces.
Though initially an inspiring avatar of freedom, Julia — for all intents and purposes the only female character in the book — fails to emerge as Winston’s intellectual and moral equal. He longs for revolution; she doesn’t want to rock the boat. He’s fascinated by the theories behind Party protocol outlined in the Resistance’s book; she literally can’t keep her eyes open as he reads them to her. The lies of history matter to him; she couldn’t care less:
….she only questioned the teachings of the Party when they in some way touched upon her own life.
“I’m not interested in the next generation, dear. I’m interested in us.”
“You’re only a rebel from the waist downwards,” he told her.
She thought this brilliantly witty and flung her arms round him in delight.
One hopes these character flaws of Julia’s are due to her role as Winston’s foil, and not to the perceived inferiorities of her gender — or to her unbridled female sexuality. But while Orwell tries valiantly to be progressive about sex, he sometimes seems mired by his own prejudices about women: how they should look (pretty, painted and curvy), how they should relate to sex (be into it, just not too into it), and how they should be in the world (readily available to men).
In one scene at their secret rendezvous, Julia applies some contraband make-up to her face, much to Winston’s delight:
Her lips were deeply reddened, her cheeks rouged, her nose powdered; there was even a touch of something under the eyes to make them brighter. It was not very skillfully done, but Winston’s standards in such matters were not high. He had never before seen or imagined a woman of the Party with cosmetics on her face. The improvement in her appearance was startling. With just a few dabs of colour in the right places she had become not only very much prettier, but, above all, far more feminine. Her short hair and boyish overalls merely added to the effect….
…”Do you know what I’m going to do next? I’m going to get hold of a real woman’s frock from somewhere and wear it instead of these bloody trousers. I’ll wear silk stockings and high-heeled shoes! In this room I’m going to be a woman, not a Party comrade.”
After the shortages and rationing of World War II, when looking one’s “best” became a patriotic duty for women in a capitalistic society fighting a fascist who apparently hated cosmetics, this scene makes total sense — it reflects a longing for “normalcy” that readers of the time could surely sympathize with. But with the benefit of historical distance, 21st-century readers (at least the ones in my book club) can’t help but see the power of patriarchy running beneath it — a controlling force which limits the things you can say, the places you can go, and the ways you can exist in the world (sound familiar?) if you’re a woman, especially a woman in 1949. Narrow definitions of femininity (and masculinity, for that matter) don’t exactly make for a freer society.
Even after Winston and Julia have been together for a while, enjoying an unorthodox and fairly egalitarian, sexually-driven relationship, his sense of entitlement from earlier in the book doesn’t dissipate — surprisingly, it grows. When she tells him they won’t be able to meet because her period has come early, Winston becomes “violently angry”:
During the month that he had known her the nature of his desire for her had changed. At the beginning there had been little true sensuality in it. Their first love-making had been simply an act of the will. But after the second time it was different. The smell of her hair, the taste of her mouth, the feeling of her skin seemed to have got inside him, or into the air all round him. She had become a physical necessity, something that he not only wanted but felt that he had a right to. When she said that she could not come, he had the feeling that she was cheating him.
Winston is both worshipful and possessive, thanks to his dystopian environment and mid-20th-century sexism.
We can’t expect 1984, written in 1949, to align with the liberal social norms of 2017. But we can certainly appreciate all the elements that made it a book ahead of its time, while being thankful all the assumptions that keep it a product of its time are behind us — well, at least behind those of us who are part of the Resistance.
War Is Hell Freedom Is Feminism Ignorance Is Stupid
There was a time in Bachelor history when fantasy suite sex was never mentioned outright, it was only hinted at. Those hints grew more blunt over the years: cameras were let into the bedrooms of the suites for a bit, mics were left on longer. But in honor of at least the illusion of class, things never got too gratuitously overt.
Remember the scandal of current Bachelor Nick Viall, just two years ago, committing the ultimate faux pas of admitting on camera that intercourse had indeed occurred between him and Andi Dorfman? “If you weren’t in love with me,” he asked her on After the Final Rose, “why did you make love with me?” The masses, including Andi, were outraged. That was private, that was between just the two of them, was nothing sacred? In her tell-all It’s Not Okay, she tried to get back at him for his lack of discretion by indiscreetly disparaging his sexual style during their fantasy suite interlude (an effort that only really succeeded in making her sound uptight and judgmental). By then the cat was let out of the bag, but the clear message was that the cat should have never been let out in the first place.
But as of last night’s episode, it’s apparently one big pussy free-for-all on The Bachelor. The show, it seems, has no self-imposed line it won’t cross in its desperate appeal for ratings during a season which, despite lovable villain Corinne, is as compelling as watching acrylic nails dry. Yes, all the veils have dropped, and the contestants are now free — no doubt prodded by manipulative producers — to discuss fantasy suite sex openly on camera.
In a bold 180, ex Andi returned to give Nick some friendly (albeit awkward) pre-fantasy-suite sex advice, which basically amounted to: if you see marriage potential with anyone, then as consenting adults you owe it to yourselves to take a test drive. She called this her “feminist rant,” suggesting that there’s no shame in sexual exploration (even with multiple people), right before she again shamed Nick for admitting to the world that they did exactly what she was encouraging him to do now! (Grasping quantum mechanics takes less mental agility than it did to follow Andi down her self-satisfying rabbit hole.)
But the sex talk didn’t end there. No, the producers somehow convinced the young, black-haired Raven that it would be a good idea to share with us viewers and then again with Nick that not only has she only ever had sex with one person, but that she has never had an orgasm:
I guess my main fears today are saying I love you and having sex at the end of the night with him, because for me being physical and emotional means double the heartbreak if it ends up not being me at the end. I mean the physical part, you know, every girl wants great things, fireworks, magic to happen. But I have only had sex with one person and I’ve never had an orgasm before. It’s really taboo to discuss, but it’s important . . . And to be quite honest maybe I haven’t before with my last person because I really didn’t trust him. You just have to trust someone to be able to go there, and I think I could go there with Nick today. Here we go. Today is the day!
Even though we fear Raven may come to regret spilling these beans (how cool are Mom and Dad watching in Hoxie, Arkansas, going to be with this?) and even though we know the producers’ motivations for ruthlessly extracting this dirt are more cynical and salacious than philanthropic, this kind of honest talk about the unique realities of the show and the typical realities of new relationships is pretty damn refreshing. The problem with much of America and American sex education is that open discussions of sex are taboo; female pleasure and female orgasm are not given enough respect and emphasis; masturbation is not promoted as a healthy, natural endeavor; and pretending sex isn’t being had when we all know it is doesn’t help anyone. Good for Raven for having the courage to admit to the importance of sex to women and their desire for pleasure.
So often this show, due to its harem-like set-up, promotes a world in which women must and will do anything to win the attentions and approval of a man (look good for him, charm him, please him, don’t be too demanding) with little emphasis placed on reciprocation (how is the Bachelor himself charming and pleasing you, as an individual?). By telling Nick that she’d only been with one person and he’d never given her an orgasm, Raven not only effectively communicated important aspects of her sexual history and current emotional state (i.e. “This is a big deal to me”), but also suggested that she has a right to pleasure and expects her new partner to give her potential for orgasm equal time. That’s a much better example of responsible sexual relations than simply doing it without ever discussing one’s hopes and concerns, which has been the televised tradition on The Bachelor up to this point.
Of course people also have a right to privacy, especially when it comes to their sex lives, but to those willing to shrug off Puritanical norms and speak honestly about sex without shame, we salute you. Even Andi.
– A Review of the Best Cinematic Love Story This Year –
By now you’ve heard about the royal fuck up at the 2017 Oscars: the presenters of the Best Picture award got the wrong envelope (the one pronouncing Emma Stone as Best Actress for La La Land), they announced La La Land as the winner in error, and it wasn’t until the producers of that film were midway through their acceptance speeches when the correction was made and the Moonlight cast and crew took their rightful spot on stage. Awkward!
Will this snafu give Moonlight even more of the attention it deserves, or will everyone simply remember the 89th Academy Awards as the one where La La Land lost so spectacularly? In the moment, it definitely stole some of Moonlight’s celebratory thunder, a crying shame after last year’s homogenous nominees and winners (see #OscarsSoWhite). But if there’s any justice in the world of cinema, the better love story will prevail in the collective memory of moviegoers as supreme.
[The rest of this review contains spoilers.]
In this coming-of-age film based on the play by Tarell Alvin McCraney, we follow a young African-American boy named Chiron growing up in Miami in three acts. First, as a quiet boy nicknamed “Little”(Alex Hibbert), he’s taken under the paternal wing of local drug dealer Juan (Mahershala Ali, winning “Best Supporting Actor”) before either of them realizes the kid’s mom (Naomie Harris) is one of this guy’s best (read: worst) customers. Meanwhile, his buddy Kevin (Jaden Piner) gives him the support that neither his mom nor her dealer can, in the form of rough and tumble wrestling. Next, as a skinny, insecure teen who’s terrorized by the school bully (now played by Ashton Sanders), Chiron finds solace with Kevin (Jharrel Jerome) again, this time in a secret embrace one night on the beach — the first time Chiron’s been kissed, the first time he’s been touched. But their relationship seems karmically doomed when Kevin is soon forced by the bully to beat up Chiron for the perceived crime of being a “pussy,” a “faggot.” Finally, as a beefed-up adult in the same do-rag and with the same job as his fallen father-figure, Chiron (Trevante Rhodes) reconnects with Kevin (André Holland) who, now out of prison and with a kid of his own, is on the straight and narrow as a chef at a diner. As Kevin serves Chiron a lovingly prepared meal in one of the booths, the tension, the longing, between them is devastating. Will they or won’t they?
The brilliance of Moonlight is in its light touch. Nothing is spelled out. We’re never hit over the head. In fact, the introverted protagonist has very few total lines. The power is in what’s not spoken, what’s not shown. The love between the two kids can only be expressed in a culture that demands zero softness from boys and men by them breathlessly play-fighting each other. When his mother screams at him in a drug-addled state, all we hear is silence. We don’t witness or come to know the details of Juan’s demise, we can just sense the loss in teen Chiron’s big, sad eyes. His first erotic encounter is quiet and tender, shot with a respectful distance that honors their connection: even though they may feel shame about it afterwards, we, the viewers, don’t. And as the two sit across from each other ten years later in the diner booth, with long looks and deafening silences, we want to scream out their hearts’ desires on their behalf. If only they could drop the masks, be who they are, and say what they need to say!
Homophobia may not be well, but it’s still alive and kicking (see the Trump-approved roll outs of “Religious Freedom” bills designed to legalize discrimination). The conventional wisdom is that homophobia is more rampant among the African-American community, thanks in large part to traditional religious views. According to polls from a few years ago, black people were less likely than white people to report that homosexuality is “not wrong at all” (25% versus 40%). But that gap is closing, and also complicated by the fact that black people have historically shown more support than white people for nondiscrimination initiatives for the LGBT community. And as of 2012, the difference between white and black peoples’ views on same-sex marriage was statistically insignificant (i.e. one point). [Stats from analysis by political scientist Greg Lewis for NPR’s CodeSwitch.]
Advanced age and certain religious views probably have more to do with persistent homophobia than race does these days. And that’s compounded by the fact that society — across all races — is still quite sexist, giving credence to very narrow definitions of masculinity and femininity, which deny the former uninhibited expressions of intimacy and vulnerability. In other words, it can still be quite difficult growing up gay in America, no matter what community you belong to. Of course, add systemic racism to the mix, and those difficulties are compounded. Which is why Moonlight is a much more significant, important love story than La La Land — rather than a romantic tragedy born of simple logistics (he goes on tour with the band, she goes to Paris for a role, oh poor babies!), Moonlight is nothing short of the triumph of love, understanding and acceptance over adversity, prejudice and fear.
In the penultimate scene of the movie, we see the adult Chiron’s head resting on Kevin’s shoulder, gently caressed by his reassuring hand. Once again, director Barry Jenkins should be praised for his restraint here. There’s no passionate kiss, no steamy sex — just a beautiful snapshot of pure, long-lost love being rekindled without judgment, only reverence. The last scene briefly shows Chiron as a child, standing on the edge of an endless ocean in the twilight, looking us directly in the eye for the first time, buoyed by the confidence of his recent mastery over the waves. They will not swallow him up; he will surely rise above them.
Milo has said so many offensive, sexist, racist, xenophobic things over his career that, surprisingly (or actually, maybe not that surprisingly), weren’t enough to initially scare off CPAC. For instance, just last Friday night, while speaking on Overtime with Bill Maher, he said women and girls need to be protected in public restrooms from transgender women, who have a psychiatric disorder much like sociopathy and are disproportionately involved in sex crimes — totally failing to 1) mention that trans people are disproportionately thevictims of sex crimes, not the perpetrators, and 2) see the irony of him as a gay man making the same ludicrous, bigoted claims about one marginalized community that used to be made (and still are in some ass-backward circles) about homosexuals!
It wasn’t until the conservative magazine Reagan Battalion tweeted edited footage of him on two podcasts, defending his own and others’ sexual relationships as tween/teen boys with adults, that CPAC pulled the invite. Apparently, getting kicked off Twitter for inciting racists attacks against actress Leslie Jones wasn’t enough. But inadvertently suggesting that there’s some truth to the myth that gay men are inclined to be child molesters — a long-standing, unfounded fear held by many homophobic conservatives — crossed the line. Hey, offensive free speech is fine to CPAC, until it offends them.
Here is the uncut 5 minute video of Milo Yiannopoulos advocating for Pederasty involving “13 Year old” and “older men.” HIS WORDS.@Mschlapppic.twitter.com/mAgmfpuyvu
While I’m no fan of Milo’s, I have noticed the occasional inclination by some on the left to give him more attention and credit as a villain than he deserves. By all means protest his tour, but don’t resort to property damage and actual violence (like the Black Bloc did at Berkeley). Call him out for his casual racism and sexism, but don’t just assume he’s a full-on white nationalist (he’s on record as saying “white pride, white supremacy, white nationalism isn’t the way to go“). Don’t be the knee-jerk liberals folks like him accuse us of being without actually going to the primary source.
And so I watched the clips in question in full, as well as his press conference about the clips and his resignation, to see what exactly he said and how bad it actually was. The following is the autopsy — because while he’s said plenty of other similarly horrendous things, there’s something uniquely odious about affection for child abuse that most decent human beings, even conservative ones, cannot and will not abide. (Then again, many Americans voted for Trump — “Daddy” as Milo calls him — so we shouldn’t hold our breath.)
Was Milo sexually abused as a teen?
In the Joe Rogan #702 interview, while talking about the sexual relations he had as a young teenager with a parish priest, Yiannopoulos says it wasn’t abuse (at minute 0:51 in the below video): “I wasn’t abused as a child, or anything like that.” He reiterates this stance at minute 4:18:
Milo: It wasn’t molestation, it was perfectly consensual.
Joe: I think it is when they’re 14.
Milo: When I was 14, trust me, I was the predator, I was the predator.
Joe: You were the predator? You were chasing after the priest who was trying to stay close to god?
Milo: I was the instigator. I was chasing everybody. I was aggressively seeking out the sexual company of adults because I knew it would horrify people. Because I wanted sort of power over them. It was my way of rebelling. I was the predator at 14, let me tell you.
4. The videos do not show what people say they show. I *did* joke about giving better head as a result of clerical sexual abuse committed against me when I was a teen. If I choose to deal in an edgy way on an internet livestream with a crime I was the victim of that’s my prerogative. It’s no different to gallows humor from AIDS sufferers.
In both the Rogan interview and his interview on Drunken Peasants, it’s clear he’s making an edgy, inappropriate joke when he credits Father Michael with Milo’s own ability to give good head to this day (see the excerpt below). But in these interviews, he aggressively, not jokingly, argues that as a young teenager (around age 13 or 14), he was not the victim of abuse here — that this was indeed informed consensual sex. He makes this claim as a way to undermine progressives’ insistence on making consent a requirement of safer sex, as well as to call bullshit on “arbitrary” statutory rape laws that may make criminals or at least outcasts of sexually mature, consenting parties (imagine a 17 year old with a 20 year old, or the hypothetical grad student and professor he mentions in the Drunken Peasants interview — see below).
So it’s a bit disingenuous, now that he’s lost his book deal and CPAC invitation and Breitbart position over these comments, for him to suddenly do a complete 180 and claim, both in his written Facebook response and the press conference, that it actually wassexual abuse.
For the record: Whether or not Milo thinks it was abuse, an adult having sex with a minor is a crime. One could argue that the fact it was perpetrated by someone in a position of religious, soul-saving authority, way more than a couple years older, makes it even more heinous.
Did Milo defend pedophilia?
Technically, no. Pedophilia is defined as adult sexual interest in pre-pubescent children. But he has at times defended hebephilia (adult sexual interest in pubescent or post-pubescent 11-14 years olds) and ephebophilia (adult sexual interest in 15-19 year olds) when, according to him, the kid in question is “sexually mature” and able to give “informed and aware consent.”
The following is from the Drunken Peasants interview (minute 1:00:32):
Milo: This is a controversial point of view, I accept. We get hung up on this kind of child abuse stuff to the point where we’re heavily policing even relationships between consenting adults, you know, sort of grad students and professors at universities.
[the hosts & Milo discuss age of consent for a moment]
Milo: The law is probably about right, that’s probably roughly the right age. I think it’s probably about okay, but there are certainly people who are capable of giving consent at a younger age, I certainly consider myself to be one of them, people who are sexually active younger. I think it particularly happens in the gay world by the way. In many cases actually those relationships with older men…This is one reason I hate the left. This stupid one size fits all policing of culture. [talking over each other] This arbitrary and oppressive idea of consent, which totally destroys, you know, the understanding that many of us have [of] the complexities and subtleties and complicated nature of many relationships. You know, people are messy and complex. In the homosexual world particularly. Some of those relationships between younger boys and older men, the sort of coming of age relationships, the relationships in which those older men help those young boys to discover who they are, and give them security and safety and provide them with love and a reliable and sort of a rock where they can’t speak to their parents. Some of those relationships are the most — [fyi, in his subsequent Facebook defense, he says he should have used the term “young men” here instead of “young boys”]
Host: It sounds like Catholic priest molestation to me…
Milo [jokingly]: And you know what, I’m grateful for Father Michael. I wouldn’t give nearly such good head if it wasn’t for him.
[a minute of back & forth banter]
Host: [You’ve argued in the past that] transgenderism is the new frontier of social progress and the next thing in line is gonna be pedophilia, and yet here you are talking about how look, you know, some of these kids that get diddled by these priests, I mean it’s a good thing for them, they’re getting this love….
Milo: You’re misunderstanding what pedophilia means. Pedophilia is not a sexual attraction to somebody 13-years-old who is sexually mature. Pedophilia is attraction to children who have not reached puberty. Pedophilia is attraction to people who don’t have functioning sex organs yet. Who have not gone through puberty. Who are too young to be able [talking over each other]…That’s not what we are talking about. You don’t understand what pedophilia is if think I’m defending it because I’m certainly not.
Host [after further back and forth]: You are advocating for cross generational relationships here, can we be honest about that?”
Milo: Yeah, I don’t mind admitting that. I think particularly in the gay world and outside the Catholic church, if that’s where some of you want to go with this, I think in the gay world, some of the most important, enriching and incredibly life-affirming, important shaping relationships very often between younger boys and older men, they can be hugely positive experiences for those young boys. They can even save those young boys, from desolation, from suicide, from drug addiction….all sorts of things, providing they’re consensual.
[hosts talk]
Milo: Just because I was sexually precocious doesn’t mean that I’m going to say that every 13 year old who has sex with a 28-year-old is fine, I don’t know because I don’t know the specifics of that case. I’m not saying that every relationship involving those ages is fine. I have said many times that I consider myself an outlier and sexually precocious.
I do not support pedophilia. Period. It is a vile and disgusting crime, perhaps the very worst. There are selectively edited videos doing the rounds, as part of a co-ordinated effort to discredit me from establishment Republicans, that suggest I am soft on the subject.
If it somehow comes across (through my own sloppy phrasing or through deceptive editing) that I meant any of the ugly things alleged, let me set the record straight: I am completely disgusted by the abuse of children.
Some facts to consider:
1. I have outed THREE pedophiles in my career as a journalist. That’s three more than any of my critics and a peculiar strategy for a supposed pedophile apologist.
3. I have never defended and would never defend child abusers, as my reporting history shows. The world is messy and complicated, and I recognize it as such, as this furore demonstrates. But that is a red line for any decent person.
However, in the Joe Rogan interview, he refuses to name 1) the priest he had sexual relations with, which he’s just now (conveniently) admitting was sexual abuse and 2) the powerful adults at a Hollywood party he says he attended around 2009 who were having sex with “very young boys”:
Milo: You know I lived in Hollywood a while ago, briefly.
Joe: Did you go to one of [director Brian Singer’s] parties [who’s been accused of sexually assaulting minors]?
Milo: I went to other people who I won’t name, of a similar stature in Hollywood, I went to their boat parties and to their house parties and similar things and some of the things I have seen have beggared belief.
Joe: Yeah? Can you give us…?
Milo: I don’t want to be indiscreet about specific people….because I think it’s going to be dangerous. But I can tell you the truth without dropping anyone in it. I mean, some of the boys there were very young, very young…. There was a lot of drugs, a lot of ‘twinks’ [gay slang term used to describe young men in their late teens to early twenties] taking drugs and having unsafe sex with older men and some of these boys were very young.
So his fight against the sexual predators of minors seems to be quite selective. In his world view B.C. (before cancellation), pre-pubescents were unequivocally off-limits when it came to adult sexual attention, but sex with a post-pubescent, sexually precocious, willing kid could very well be hunky dory, age of consent laws be damned! Perhaps this perspective was a result of the complicating fact that he himself was abused, as he now admits, by that priest as a young teen and one other adult man: perhaps he’s been struggling to cope with that potentially shame-inducing fact by previously justifying it as a choice, something whole-heartedly different from the “legitimate” child sexual abuse that he formerly believed only happens to kids under a certain age.
But again, the fact remains that age of consent laws — designed to protect kids who, by definition, lack the fully-formed brain function, judgment, and agency to give proper consent to manipulative adult predators — make sexual relationships between adults and kids under 18, 17 or 16 (depending on the state) undeniably criminal. Andthere are very few people, besides Milo, who would argue that a 13 year old, no matter how sexually precocious, could give real consent to a 28-year old authority figure, even if said adolescent were enthusiastic and saying “yes.” The law certainly doesn’t.
Did he save any face at the press conference?
While reading his written statement at the press conference, he said, “At the time, I did not perceive what was happening to me as abusive. I can look back now and see that it was. I still don’t view myself as a victim. But I am one.” So when he gave these interviews just a year or so ago, he wasn’t a victim but instead a willing partner with agency as are many tweens and teens with adult “mentors”? Now that these statements have been highlighted and scrutinized and met with widespread horror, he’s suddenly a victim? While I do have sympathy for him as a victim of sexual abuse, it’s hard to muster for someone who’s sold out fellow victims all for the glory of attention and money.
During the Q&A portion of the press conference, when a reporter mentioned Milo’s line “I never say anything I don’t mean,” Milo responded that there were only two statements he made during these interviews which he didn’t mean, though he never specifies which two. The time spent on defending at least ephebophilia, maybe even hebephilia, in these podcasts is extensive (as is outlined above — and I didn’t even include all his comments on the topic!). Claiming there are only two measly statements he regrets is a transparent attempt to minimize the gravity of his horrifying verbal diarrhea and banks on the assumption that most people — including the media — won’t painstakingly take the time to listen to it (or outline it) in full.
In response to another question, he tries to dismiss his remarks during these podcasts (save for the two mystery statements he regrets, I guess) as veritable stand-up, whining in a tone he derides so many others for using: “I don’t know why I can’t make a joke about clerical sexual abuse but a drag queen in a club two blocks away can.” You absolutely can! Especially if you’re the victim of such abuse. But only if it’s crystal clear you condemn adult sexual relations with minors; only if you don’t make a long and serious, stone-faced argument for the ability of some minors to offer informed, aware, sexual consent to adults, including Catholic priests. Otherwise, don’t pretend to be outraged for getting called on your bullshit.
And it just wouldn’t be a Milo event if he didn’t totally stick his foot in it at least once: while trying to convey that childhood sexual abuse doesn’t have to define a victim for life, he said, rather indelicately, “It simply isn’t the worst thing that will ever happen to you. Going bankrupt is worse.” No, going morally bankrupt is worse.
What’s the damage done?
In his constant attention-seeking efforts to keep one-upping himself in the outrageousness department, this petulant, smooth-talking troll-boy finally backed himself into a politically incorrect corner. Getting out of it by playing the victim — even if he genuinely is one — after basing his entire career on decrying the “victimhood culture” of marginalized groups will be tricky, maybe impossible. His stupid book will certainly still be published, but with the fresh taint of this scandal around it and without the full power of Simon & Schuster’s marketing department behind it, hopefully his sales will be limp. A radical-feminist harpy can dream!
I’ll admit, sometimes Milo can make a compelling, well-articulated argument, even if I wholeheartedly disagree with him. Sometimes he can be genuinely funny. But too often his rants come at the expense of other people’s dignity and his own human decency. In these particular podcasts, he’s helped perpetuate several destructive myths: that gay men are more likely to be child molesters; that adult female child abusers are the victims of horny male teens (minute 59:00 of the Drunken Peasants podcast); that abuse might make people gay (in another Rogan interview excerpt at minute 13:00 he repeats a favorite claim that his homosexuality is, at least in large part, a transgressive, dissident, high-IQ’d choice to be daring and naughty); that child sexual abuse (especially by Catholic priests) is something to be apologized for, even celebrated (especially by Catholics, which Milo is); that because an underaged victim may have become aroused or reached climax from inappropriate sexual advances means it isn’t actually “real” abuse.
He of course has a right to make these ill-informed, unhelpful arguments; we have a duty to debunk them with better ones.
Fifty Shades Darker, the second movie in the trilogy based on the best-selling erotica series by E.L. James, certainly looks darker — the shadows are blacker, the skies are grayer, the rain is heavier. Every day in this movie feels like Sunday. But if you’re looking for an exploration of the more unnerving and dismaying aspects of human sexuality, you won’t find it here — except for maybe in the main character’s willingness to put up with abusive behavior.
At the end of the first film, newly sexually woke Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) walks out on billionaire boyfriend Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan) after experiencing, per her request, the worst of his sadistic tendencies: an ass-flogging that probably prohibited sitting for at least a week. Definitely not her cup of tea (because even though she lives in Seattle, the cradle of Starbucks, she prefers English Breakfast — that’s how quirky and free-spirited she is). Audiences could practically hear “I Will Survive” playing in her head as the penthouse elevators doors closed and she said goodbye firmly and forcefully to Christian forever.
Or at least until he shows up one minute into the new movie, with an apparent protein shake addiction and even worse hair pie than before, asking for her back. (Seriously, we don’t know how the film’s stylists managed to make hot Jamie Dornan not hot, but they succeeded spectacularly.) Despite numerous red flags that his old, controlling habits are proving hard to break — he says “I don’t like strangers gawking at you,” tries to order her food at a restaurant, threatens to carry her over his shoulder caveman style if she won’t come along with him, buys the publishing company she’s now working for — Ana throws caution to the wind, lays down a few ground rules (i.e. “no more rules”), makes him go grocery shopping for vanilla ice cream (for real), and takes him back in a snap.
This time around, the obstacles to their love include a manipulative, controlling, sexually abusive boss (but not in the “good” way like Christian); a mentally unstable ex-submissive of Grey’s who’s so jealous of Ana she wants to shoot her in the face; and Christian’s first lover (Kim Bassinger who shows up in a kick-ass tux), the older woman whose sexual domination of him years ago transformed him from a troubled teen (with a “Chronicles of Riddick” poster in his childhood bedroom) into a disciplined business mogul (with an Edvard Munch original hanging in his adult bedroom). Save for a single surprising gun shot, these plot lines are plodding. Despite the elegant set design, high-end wardrobes and tasteful mood lighting, they can’t be saved from the fact they were born of horrendously written fan fiction. We don’t even get to see Grey crash-land his helicopter, which he walks away from with a little head scratch and some tousled hair (the best it looks in the entire two hours!), not simply because that kind of scene just wasn’t in the budget, but because that kind of scene is just simply preposterous.
But, let’s be honest, who’s going to see a Fifty Shades movie for the plot twists and character development? You go to Fifty Shades for the sex. So did it deliver in that department? Yes and no.
On the plus side, there’s quite a bit of cunnilingus for an R-rated movie (and no fellatio) — many a straight woman’s dream come true. Several scenes have a sense of humor, which grounds them and makes them more relatable. In one instance, when Christian seductively presents Ana with some Ben Wa balls and asks her to try them, she says flatly, “No, you’re not putting those in my butt” (FYI: they’re meant for the vagine). In another, when Grey catches her snooping around his playroom of kinky accessories after meeting his housekeeper, she asks, “Does she dust in here?” (the very same question that crossed my mind just three seconds earlier as she fondled the drawers of blindfolds and nipple clamps!). And Jamie Dornan’s sculpted pecs and abs get some loving attention from the cinematographer — we even get to see some of his rather fluffy, pre-stem pubes!
The highlight is the elevator scene (pictured below), which comes closest to capturing the erotic appeal of the entire franchise: a woman being teased, tantalized and talked dirty to in a taboo way without the expectation of reciprocation. There’s no obligatory female nudity, no over-the-top performative moaning, just a girl enjoying the secret, sexual attention of a boy she likes in a way and in a place they’re not really “supposed” to. The scene’s effectiveness to arouse stems from what it doesn’t show — viewers are allowed to use their own imagination to fill in the erotic blanks as they see fit, as was the case with the Fifty Shades books (and is so often not the case with your typical porn, soft-core or otherwise).
Had more of the sex scenes taken this slower, more cerebral approach, the movie would have come closer to fulfilling its erotic potential. But as is too often the case in real life, much of the sex lacked foreplay, felt rushed, and ended with your standard pelvic thrusts — perhaps a casualty of having a man (James Foley) direct this time. There was very little in the way of actual kink, which is all about creating tension and suspense. For instance, dripping oil on a woman’s breasts and kneading them like soft dough does not exactly grant you automatic membership in the The Eulenspiegel Society. When they did get around to some actual spanking, it lacked oomph: no build-up, no alternating of cheeks, no caressing between the three — count ’em, three — measly whacks. And once again, there was not enough male nudity. A bit of butt crack and one full body shot from the back that you’d miss if you blinked just won’t cut it, especially when any of us movie-goers could pick out Dakota Johnson’s breasts from a lineup by now!
Even the emotionally climactic scene in the second book, in which Christian reverts to his teenage submissiveness in a panicked effort to keep Ana from leaving him, is pretty ho-hum in the movie. We don’t see his trauma-induced vulnerability, we don’t sense the power dynamic seismically shift, we don’t feel the electricity between them when he finally allows her to touch his scarred chest. They seem to just be going through the motions — two ambitious actors perhaps a bit embarrassed by the cheesiness of this whole lucrative project.
The movie’s saving grace, once again, is its soundtrack, with songs by Halsey, Sia, JP Cooper, Anderson East and Jeff Buckley (though you won’t find this last one on the official album). Let Fifty Shades Darker inspire your own playlist and then have the kind of sex to it that you’ll wished you’d seen in the movie.
