Comments for Wee Divine

Comment on And the patriarchy continues… by weedivine

weedivine — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 03:24:52 +0000

1) Just because you’re female and enjoy playing GTA 4 does not make it NOT sexist or fucked up
2) Just because anyone enjoys anything does not excuse the fucked up or damaging nature of it. I like lots of stuff that is damaging and sexist. That doesn’t give it an excuse. It makes it hard to be honest about the thing we enjoy, it does not make it fine.
3) The details of where or not the game requires you to kill a prostitute have nothing to do with if the game is messed up. The fact that you can kill prostitutes in one of the most popular games of all time is messed up. I’m not hear to give you all the reasons or anaylsis, check out feministing.com. they’ve done some good stuff on the game.
4) The “bad guys” were all men? That makes the game ok? Or somehow should placate a feminist objection?
5) Ok, so the game is redeeming because the cops will come after you if you kill innocents, and you’re not required to kill any females. Why thank you GTA 4! How enlightened! I think we’ve missed the point if that’s the redeeming factor. Because, oh yeah, you’re killing people. And you’re limiting it to men…. how nice of you to spare us women. HELLLOOOOOOO!!!!

Comment on And the patriarchy continues… by Pungo

Pungo — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 21:32:47 +0000

Er… I enjoy playing GTA4 and I’m female. The game doesn’t actually make you kill even one prostitute, in fact I can’t remember being required to kill any females at all. The “bad guys” were all men. In fact, if you kill innocent bystanders, you usually have the police on your tail shortly thereafter.

Comment on NPR Morning Edition on this year’s “Women in Sports” by weedivine

weedivine — Fri, 30 May 2008 00:04:16 +0000

It would help change the culture. But running around pandering to every uneducated and ignorant dude with a mic in the media, asking them to change their minds and save us, is not really what the movement is about. Education, totally, allies, totally… but its bigger than him, even though his opinion brings it all back to “me me me me” and HIS opinion. So no, he can’t be female athletes knight in shining armour, but of course it would be grand if he would get educated and help the cause.

Comment on NPR Morning Edition on this year’s “Women in Sports” by ubuntucat

ubuntucat — Thu, 29 May 2008 21:05:22 +0000

These people who so unreasonably expect that female atheletes should be treated as athletes, certainly did not propose fixing it through media folks like yourself seeing the light, or asking them pretending that female athletes to not have bodies.

Actually, media folk like DeFord seeing the light might help change the culture, though.

Comment on Night Life by Jae

Jae — Tue, 27 May 2008 15:38:00 +0000

Fantastic post!!

In the past, I thought I was confident enough for the club scene however as I get older (and wiser, and I’ve actually gained some confidence) I see that it wasn’t really my lack of confidence that kept me out of clubs: it is my lack of desire to be objectified. But because (on TV and in the movies and in the stories of my less enlightened friends) women are supposed to enjoy being hit on, I always imagined there was something wrong with me for being bothered by catcalls and guys trying to chat me up while staring at my boobs.

I remember one night being out at a show in a bar with a friend (one of the aforementioned less enlightened ones) when these two guys started talking to us. I really had no interest in talking to them, but everything was fine until they offered to buy us a drink. My friend accepted and I declined, and after that one made it his personal mission to…well, honestly, I’m not sure if he was trying to win me over or punish me for not being interested. He proceeded to try and get me to dance with him by grinding himself against me, and though I wish I had punched him in the face, I felt paralyzed. I continued to verbally turn him down, and I acted both hostile and angry (or as my friend called it “rude”), but nothing stopped him from touching me until I managed to get my friend to go to the bathroom. He still came looking for us, and my friend spent the night flirting with his friend, but after the bathroom trip, he left me alone.

I was disgusted and felt extremely violated, but my friend was actually angry at me…I was rude and miserable, she said, and I overreacted to a guy just trying to be “friendly.” As you said, she bought into the idea that this was a form of flattery instead of a declaration of ownership, and I became a bitch beause I didn’t go along with it.

Wow…sorry I hijaked the comments here, but what you said really resonated with me.

Again, great post!

Comment on Night Life by weedivine

weedivine — Mon, 26 May 2008 01:36:39 +0000

Ahhh…. the complexities of anaylsis emerge Well…
Colleen- point well taken and keenly named. I think this is what I was getting at with my “feeling sorry for” thing- standards for behavior are so low that even behavior with marks of nastiness get rewarded due to their relative acceptablitiy. Relative.
It is entirely possible and probable that Nice GuyTM was going on, and don’t worry he wasn’t the saviour of my shitty evening (cause that would just be too fucked up wouldn’t it?) so no need to worry about deconstructing it furthur.
Sean- Well…. I think that there’s 2 levels going on here, though not without major intersection (yah know, personal is political and all that) Certainly, being treated with the slightest amount of humanity was a good thing, but I think that my point was more along the lines of, as I said above, how low the standard for male behavior in that setting has become, so that some personal part of me felt the need to reward the less politically horrific actions of this guy… I can say for certain that there was no part of me who wanted to dance with him, save the part which felt I owed him something (headshake.) Thanks for reading!

Comment on Night Life by Colleen

Colleen — Mon, 26 May 2008 00:48:28 +0000

I hate to crap all over the highlight of your shitty evening, but it actually seems to me like that dude was trying really hard to turn his dating life into a romantic comedy, setting himself up as the sweet, bumbling Hugh Grant-type that the ladiez just can’t resist. It’s like he’s already telling the story in his head: “I was so tongue-tied I purposely bumped into her just to have an excuse to talk! And then I felt bad for deceiving her even this tiny bit because my ~~lust~~ love for her is so pure that I immediately confessed, and she was so touched by my socially-awkward earnestness that she agreed to go out with me. And the rest is history.”

Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather have that guy, who at least took a hint, than the dude who’s all, “Oh, let me just reach past you for my beer and, gee, did I just accidentally rub every inch of my arm along your breasts? How clumsy I am!”, but I think your suitor may have been a Nice GuyTM.

Comment on Night Life by Sean (claire's boyfriend)

Sean (claire's boyfriend) — Sun, 25 May 2008 22:45:47 +0000

I tried to leave a comment but it didn’t work!

I said something like this:
What would be an appropriate role for men to play in the nightlife situation? What would be an appropriate role for women to play? Would those roles be different?

I found your blog through your facebook profile one day and I like reading it. I always want to comment because I think it’s really interesting but I never have anything to contribute (not having thought about these issues nearly as much as you have). I like it a lot though, and wanted you to know.

Comment on Night Life by Sean (claire's boyfriend)

Sean (claire's boyfriend) — Sun, 25 May 2008 22:41:27 +0000

What would be a good role for a man to play in nightlife situations? For that matter what would be a good role for a woman to play? Would these roles be different?

I understand what you mean when you say it was sad that you “almost felt like [you] should have danced with him out of thanks”, but on another level I think it’s natural and doesn’t speak simply to the idea that because he was better than terrible you owed him something. By having a conversation, it seems like you see one another as people for a minute and that reasonably might evoke friendly feelings simply because you’re now people and not just objectifying one another. I mean to say that you might have felt like you should have danced with him not entirely out of thanks, but perhaps wanted to, out of discovering that he was better than you expected him to be. I don’t think that’s a terrible thing. Of course I don’t inhabit your mind and am just conjecturing, hope you don’t mind.

I found your blog on your facebook profile one day and I really like reading it. I always want to comment because I think it’s interesting, but I never have anything to contribute (I haven’t thought about these things nearly as much as you have), but I thought you should know that I like it.

p.s. regarding your other post today 1.) I didn’t know you could call someone a “ho” on television and 2.) I’m so glad I don’t watch tv news channels, how embarrassing for them

Comment on NPR on transgender children by weedivine

weedivine — Sun, 18 May 2008 23:59:30 +0000

Julie-
Thanks so much for your comment. I certainly meant in no way to say that these transgender children would be content simply “acting” out the performance of their gender. One of the young girls sisters commented on this, saying that she couldn’t imagine what it would be like to watch your body develop into something that you didn’t see yourself as. Of course transwomen and men are just as much men or women as those who are born with corresponding physical attributes for their gender. I fully recognize that this is an important piece.
I was trying to convey my frustration at the pigeon holing of gender behavior, simple as when the young boy liked pink more than blue, we must see that as not just an indication that pink is a naturally “girlie” color (it isn’t but look deeper into how a young person is chosing outlets that let her identify as a girl in our society. Many of these gender idenitfiers are used to oppress those who identify as women, that’s all I was getting at here, and many people think that the gender dichotomy is a tool of oppression. As you said, when your physical gender doesn’t match, friction occurs. The ideals about gender, to me, are also problematic in that, artificial ideas about what makes a real man or woman. But again, I in no way want to attack transpeople from their gender, or fall into the trope of accusing transpeople of pepetuating gender stereotypes. Its delicate…
In my discussion of gender performance, I was not at all trying to say that transpeople should just “perform” their chosen gender, and ignore their bodies. Certainly not! However, again, I think that the performative nature of gender would indicate that gender is not something set, lending credance to the idea that someone born into a “man” body could identify as a woman- the two don’t HAVE TO match up as we’ve been tricked into believing, there’s nothing wrong with that (and the person is not, therfor, wrong for changing their body if they so choose.)
Your point about genetic testing is right on, thanks for bringing that up.
Thanks for expressing so acutely your experience in your comment, I am impressed with your ability to convey your story, its profound.
The Stranger in Seattle recently ran a piece on crossing dressing and some transmen… it talked about the loss of male privilege that transwomen experience, I am curious about this piece. If you care, would you comment on that also?
Thanks again