I'm not "offended," Julien Blanc. I'm terrified.

[Content note: sexual violence]

I wasn’t going to comment on this Julien Blanc thing because it wouldn’t be anything I haven’t already said many times. However, I was catching up on my saved articles and found this bit from a piece about Blanc being denied entry into Great Britain:

For now he has canceled the remainder of his tour. Describing himself as the “most-hated man in the world,” a nervous-looking Mr. Blanc apologized “for everything” on Monday in a CNN interview. He said he had not been choking the women in the photographs but merely had his hands around their throats. It was all “a horrible, horrible attempt at humor” that had been “taken out of context in a way,” he said.

“I just want to apologize, you know, to anybody I’ve offended in any way,” Mr. Blanc said.

This made me see red. This word “offense” gets thrown around whenever something like this happens and someone apologizes for it, as if “offense” was ever the problem. As though my desire to go about my day without having a strange man run up to me, put his hands around my neck, and force my face into his genitals has anything to do with “offense.”

Then I remembered a recent interaction I had on Facebook with a man who had made extremely inappropriate comments on my posts months ago and been roundly rebuked for it by me and my friends. Last week he sent me a message apologizing and asking if we could be friends. I responded very calmly and formally, accepted the apology, and said that I am not interested in being friends at this time. He wrote back, accepting my answer but adding, “I feel bad that I hurt you so much that you’d prefer not to be friends.”

This statement was the only part of all of this that made me feel any emotion at all–namely, anger. I had never been “hurt” by this man. I was not upset. I was not “offended.” I simply didn’t want anything to do with someone who would say and do the things he had proven himself to be willing to say and do. My choice not to interact with him further was informed by my knowledge of his willingness to cross boundaries, and even if he had changed significantly as a person since that incident, I wasn’t interested in taking that risk.

I was angry that he presumed my emotional state, as men so often do. I was angry that I was given no space to reject his offer of friendship except as a consequence of my feelings. I was angry that he thought that he, one of dozens of men who have disrespected me, crossed my boundaries, and hurled sexual harassment at me in the past year alone, actually thought that he had the power to substantially influence my emotions.

I am not comparing this particular man to Julien Blanc. Not even at all. Rather, I’m illustrating the belief that people (women) choose who to avoid or cut out of their lives or protest against solely on the basis of their feelings. I declined this man’s friendship because I was “upset.” Women protested against Blanc entering Great Britain because they were “offended.”

The NYT article echoed this in a different way in its lede: “This week, Julien Blanc became possibly the first man ever denied a visa on grounds of sexism.”

Attention-grabbing exaggerations aside, this is inaccurate. Blanc was not denied a visa because he holds sexist beliefs. He was denied a visa because he was threatening to assault people and encouraging others to do the same. Later in the article:

But as women’s rights and antiviolence campaigners point out, videos and photos of Mr. Blanc explicitly encourage men to harass women and lower their self-confidence in order to have sex with them. One tip suggests that men make derogatory comments about other women’s bodies to flatter their prey. Others recommend pretending to grieve over the recent death of a girlfriend or threatening suicide.

[…] The video clip that caused the most outrage was filmed in Tokyo and shows Mr. Blanc pulling women’s faces into his crotch on the street. In one scene, he harasses a visibly distressed Japanese cashier by kissing her neck and ear.

It is abundantly clear why Blanc presents a danger to women. Yet he, as many other men do, used language like “offended” to describe what he perceives as the backlash against him.

Pay attention to this. This is one of many ways people delegitimize our demands to be free from harassment, assault, and abuse. “Offense” is subjective. “Offense” can be caused by “thin skin,” “weakness,” “intolerance of dissenting views,” and so on. “Offense” is a reaction to a claim or idea with which you disagree.

I am, in fact, offended by Julien Blanc’s views on women, but that’s not why I want him to stay far away from me. I want him to stay far away from me because he has a record of harassing, assaulting, and abusing women, and I do not want to be harassed, assaulted, and abused. It is my right as a human being to be free from these things. It is reasonable for a country to deny a visa to a traveler who intends to enter that country in order to harass, assault, and abuse its citizens.

I have had strange men put their hands on me both in public and in private enough times to know the terror of not knowing–not knowing what will happen next, what someone who delights in making women uncomfortable will be willing to do. I no longer have the luxury of merely being “offended” at the idea that someone might do such a thing. It has happened enough times for the thought of sharing physical space with Julien Blanc to be terrifying, not offensive.

Julien Blanc imagines–or, more likely, pretends–that he is “the most-hated man in the world” because his ideas offend people. The only reason I care about the contents of his mind is because those seem to correlate quite strongly with violent, abusive behavior that harms me and people I care about.

And by the way, you cannot take sexual assault “out of context.” There is no context that makes it no longer assault, unless there was consent given and it was never assault in any context to begin with.

~~~

As a small sidenote, I’m annoyed by how many of the articles about Julien Blanc, including ones from writers I really respect, took space to insult his physical appearance. As someone who has written for publication before, I know that word limits are almost always in effect, and taking valuable space to make childish and irrelevant insults to someone’s looks means that much less space to use on actual points. It’s not just that insulting someone’s appearance is mean and pointless, though–it also makes you come across like you don’t have a better argument against them (even if you do). We should stop doing it. I say this not because I care about Julien Blanc’s feelings, but because I care about ethical consistency and good writing.

(Remember, too, that the problem with men like Blanc is not that they are “lonely” or “pathetic” or “desperate for female attention.” Many men are lonely and pathetic and desperate for female (or male) attention, and so are many women. That’s not what makes them creepy predators. Many people manage to be lonely and pathetic and desperate for sex without ever harassing or assaulting anyone.)

I'm not "offended," Julien Blanc. I'm terrified.
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Housekeeping & Open Thread

Hello! I’ve been too busy to do very much writing that isn’t for pay (that is, the Daily Dot). I haven’t even had a chance to do any proper link roundups, so I haven’t shared these two things with you:

1. I had the opportunity to be a guest on a lovely podcast called Sex For Smart People. In this episode, we discussed catcalling, female orgasms, Jian Ghomeshi, Gamergate, that Northwestern University professor who was accused of sexual assault and responded by suing the accuser, and affirmative consent laws. And more. Check it out here.

2. Skepticon is tomorrow! I’m repeating my workshop from last year, Getting It On at the Con: How to Get Lucky Consensually. It’ll be at 3 PM tomorrow in the delightfully named Maui Ballroom. Same deal as last time. In addition, I am taking my DSLR to Skepticon, so if you are there and want nice shots of your outfits, find me and let me know! I will not think you are vain. I love photographing people.

Immediately following Skepticon, I’ll be spending a lovely week at home in Ohio, where I will cook an entire Thanksgiving dinner for many people. Hopefully some actual writing will get done during that time, too.

Since I’ve been so absent lately, let’s do an open thread! What have you been reading or writing lately? What’s going on in your life? How are you coping with these bullshit temperatures? Why is your city the absolute best city in the world? (You’ve already heard my answer to that question, so I’m opening it up to you.) How do you feel about [current event I have not written about]? Here is your chance to talk about all the stuff you can’t normally talk about in my threads because it would be off-topic!

Housekeeping & Open Thread

Four Better Ways To Prevent Sexual Assault Than Blaming Victims

My newest Daily Dot piece is up. It’s about Don Lemon’s inappropriate remarks to Joan Tarshis about her allegations against Bill Cosby, and how we can do better.

As allegations that Bill Cosby raped 15 different women continue to ripple through the Internet and the entertainment world—spurred, perhaps, by the fact that a man finally signal-boosted them—controversial CNN news anchor Don Lemon wants to know: Why didn’t accuser Joan Tarshis simply bite Cosby’s penis to avoid being coerced into giving him oral sex?

This, apparently, was the question on Lemon’s mind as he listened to Tarshis’s story.

Lemon later apologized, stating that he “never want[ed] to suggest that any victim could have prevented a rape.” While this is notable, unfortunately, that’s exactly what was suggested.

While Lemon’s question, which he claimed that he “had to ask,” stands out in its graphic inappropriateness, it’s a common practice to ask survivors of sexual assault why they didn’t “just” this or “simply” that. Whether it comes from prurient interest or supposed concern, many people who try to discuss sexual assault with survivors get caught up in the details of what the survivor could have theoretically, in a perfect universe, if they had thought of it in time rather than experiencing (as many victims do) too much fear or shock, done to prevent the assault.

First of all, it is not the responsibility of people targeted by sexual assault to prevent said assault. The fact that this still needs to be repeated, over and over, is disgraceful.

Second, there are many more survivors than there are rapists, and rapists get away with it because they are rarely held responsible for their actions.

Throughout history, the responsibility for preventing sexual assault has been placed on the shoulders of its potential victims. People like Don Lemon have probably been giving women these “tips” for millennia. Yet it hasn’t seemed to do any good. Isn’t it about time to try something else?

Maybe Lemon should be giving us some tips on how to hold powerful men accountable instead. Here’s a start.

1) Recognize celebrities have power.

In general, people seem to be pretty bad at thinking of social dynamics in terms of power. Many have trouble understanding the fact that white people and men have excess power in our society, for instance.

So do celebrities of any gender, and male celebrities especially. People who are so widely and strongly admired and valued wield a tremendous amount of influence without even intending to. When they do intend to, it gets even stronger.

This is especially true when a celebrity has something a non-celebrity wants—like fame, access, and opportunities. Many (if not all) of the women who have accused Bill Cosby of rape were young aspiring entertainers to whom Cosby offered mentorship. When people dismiss their allegations because some of them took a long time to come forward, ask yourself—what would it take to get you to destroy what might be your only shot at the career you want? Would accusing a famous, beloved man of sexual assault—and probably being dismissed, harassed, or even threatened as a result—really seem worthwhile?

Men like Cosby know this. They know that they have the power to make or break these young women’s chances in the industry. They know that they will be allowed to get away with it. And so they keep doing it.

Read the rest here.

Four Better Ways To Prevent Sexual Assault Than Blaming Victims

Why Dudes Don't Greet Dudes

My newest Daily Dot piece is about #DudesGreetingDudes.

After that NYC catcalling video went viral online, some men (not all men!) were upset, not because they were trying to defend their right to shout “nice tits” at a random woman, but because even non-sexual comments were being defined as harassment. For instance, Michael Che, co-host of Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update, wrote on Facebook, “I want to apologize to all the women I’ve harassed with statements like ‘hi’ or ‘have a nice day.’”

In response to comments like these, This Week in Blackness CEO Elon James White created a hashtag called #DudesGreetingDudes:

The #DudesGreetingDudes tweets are hilarious because they’re ridiculous. After all, everyone knows men would never actually talk to each other like that.

But why wouldn’t they?

The common explanation is that street harassment—yes, including the “nice,” non-explicitly sexual kind—is ultimately about asserting male dominance over women, forcing them to give men their time and attention. It wouldn’t make sense for a man to infringe on another man’s mental and physical space in that way.

But I think there’s also a little more going on here, and it has to do with the ways in which men are socialized to view women not only as sexual objects, but as their sole outlet for companionship, support, and affirmation. They’re socialized to view women as caretakers and entertainers, too.

Read the rest here.

Why Dudes Don't Greet Dudes

Did Lena Dunham Sexually Abuse Her Sister?

[Content note: child sexual abuse]*

My Daily Dot piece about Lena Dunham went up yesterday, but I was out walking 14 miles of Manhattan so I didn’t have time to link it here. This was published before Dunham released her statement, which partially (but not nearly entirely) addresses some of my concerns.

Lena Dunham’s recently released memoir, Not That Kind of Girl, has stirred up a lot of controversy, and probably not the controversy that Dunham hoped to stir up.

Several passages in the book detail the Girls creator and actress’ childhood sexual experimentation with her sister, Grace, who is six years younger. After a conservative writer quoted the passages and accused Dunham of sexual abuse, the internet exploded.

The passages describe Lena Dunham playing with her sister’s vagina when Dunham was seven and her sister was one year old. She also writes about bribing her sister with candy so that she could kiss her on the lips and masturbating in bed next to her. Their mother was aware of at least some of the behavior, but apparently didn’t think much of it. “My mother didn’t bother asking why I had opened Grace’s vagina,” she writes. “This was within the spectrum of things I did.”

Not all of Dunham’s critics have been conservative columnists, however. Many women, especially women of color, have been active on Twitter, discussing the passages and how they exemplify the abuse that others have faced in childhood. These critics have started a hashtag called #DropDunham, calling on Planned Parenthood to end its partnership with her:

Meanwhile, others think there’s nothing wrong with Dunham’s actions:

 

[…]Did Lena Dunham abuse her sister? That depends on a lot of things, some of which we may not know without getting more information. However, there are a number of things about Dunham’s behavior as she describes it herself that bring up red flags.

Read the rest here.

~~~

*Although I personally avoided definitively labeling Lena Dunham’s actions as child sexual abuse, I included this content note out of respect for those who consider it such and find it triggering.

Did Lena Dunham Sexually Abuse Her Sister?

How To Disagree on Twitter

I finally wrote another Daily Dot piece!

There are a few rarely-questioned Internet truisms. One is “don’t feed the trolls.” Another is that Twitter is a place where real conversations go to die.

It’s certainly true that there are things about Twitter that make it really difficult for in-depth discussion, especially if that discussion involves disagreement. Twitter is fast-paced, character-limited, and almost entirely public. Feeling pressured to respond quickly and fit complex thoughts into short bits of text, people may express themselves unclearly. Others may jump in, take tweets out of context, and misunderstand the nature of the conversation or the opinions being expressed.

However, having had many productive disagreements on Twitter, I don’t believe that it’s impossible to do. It just takes some thought and practice. Here’s how.

1) Figure out if you actually want to have a conversation

I say this because a lot of people don’t. They may not want to for all sorts of reasons—it’s exhausting, they’ve tried before, it’s triggering, they’re worried that the person will treat them badly, they’re just too upset, they’ve got other things to do. But often, people feel expected or obligated to discuss sensitive topics with total strangers because they think they “ought” to educate them.

But you don’t. You don’t owe that to anyone, no matter how much you know or how well-spoken you are.

Other times people do want to engage, but they don’t want to discuss. Sometimes they just want to express anger at the person or tell them to shut up and leave them alone. I think this can sometimes accomplish a lot of useful things, but it’s not the same thing as having a conversation with someone in order to understand their view and educate them about yours. When responding to someone on Twitter—or anywhere, really—it can be helpful to have a clear idea of what exactly you’re hoping to accomplish.

2) Assume best intentions

If you’re hoping to have a substantive conversation with someone, this is as important as it is difficult. Try to assume that, as wrong as they are, the person you’re talking probably means well. If you’ve ever tried talking to someone who seems to be convinced that you’re a terrible person who wants to hurt them, you probably know that that doesn’t usually go so well. It takes incredible patience and confidence to continue to calmly engage with someone who seems to think the worst of them, and, unfortunately, few of the people we encounter online (or anywhere else) will have these qualities.

Assuming best intentions doesn’t mean you have to keep doing so in the face of contradictory evidence. Once someone has shown that they do not have the best of intentions—for instance, by continuing to use words you have said are hurtful, constantly interpreting everything you say in the worst possible light, or expressing a belief that you find completely, destructively abhorrent—you can safely go ahead and stop assuming that they’re basically a decent person who just doesn’t get the message you’re trying to deliver. At that point, having a conversation might not be possible.

3) Learn first, teach later

When you see someone being wrong on the Internet, it can be tempting to immediately tell them why they’re wrong. I fall victim to this temptation all the time. However, it can be more useful to first try to learn more about the beliefs that led them to say the wrong thing. Not only does it build rapport with the person—which can be useful for influencing their opinions later—but it also gives you valuable information about why people believe the things they believe. Even if you think you already know, you might still learn something new by asking.

This is especially important on Twitter, where criticism often seems to come from nameless, faceless strangers who are easy to just ignore (or perhaps lash out at). Opening with a question to learn more about the person’s opinions might make it more likely that they’ll listen to you later.

Read the rest here.

On Facebook, my friend Wesley of Living Within Reason made this critique of a later part of the article:

My disagreement is with your instruction that “if someone tells you they want to end a discussion, respect that. End it. Stop talking to them. Say “Okay!” and stop trying to get the last word in.” Getting the last word is powerful psychologically. When someone is cut off in the middle of an argument without getting to finish their point or answer a counterargument, it can be upsetting and painful (and leave to all kind of intrusive thoughts later). Especially when a conversation is public, I don’t think people have a right to silence the people arguing against them by saying “I don’t want to talk about this anymore.” ESPECIALLY when the person ending the conversation makes an argument or presses a point before ending it.

I’ve written before: “If there are any ethical maxims to argumentation, this is one: you can’t both end the argument before it resolves AND have the last word. You have to pick one.” I think that if you want to end the argument, then ethically, you must allow the other person to have the last word. If you then continue the argument afterward, I don’t think there is any reason to blame the other party for answering your final point or wanting to finish their thought.

Most of the time, I see the desire to have the last word characterized as petulant or childish, but I really don’t see it that way. I think it’s a valid thing to want, and I don’t think it’s right to tell people they can’t have it because their opponent says so.

I’d also like to clarify that, of course, there’s a difference between giving a final thought and harassing someone. While I think it’s ok to answer an argument that the other person made, give a summation, or finish a point, it is NOT ok to flood a person with more than one or two tweets after they’ve said they no longer want to talk about it. I’m just talking about a very brief closing, not a bunch of harassing pings trying to goad the person into continuing the argument or calling them a coward or anything like that.

I think this is much closer to what I was trying to articulate, so I endorse it!

How To Disagree on Twitter