One answer is cynical but too easy and therefore boring and distracting: What men do is called harassment, but women can do the same thing and if you criticize them at all, you'll get criticized for slut shaming. Some might say it's a justified female privilege because the odds are so much greater that a man wants sexual overtures from a woman and because the odds are so much less that a man will feel physically threatened by a woman. Others will say this female privilege discriminates against men or is hypocritical, because you're ready to punish men for what women get away with all the time.
But maybe the term "slut shaming" is applied to different words/behavior than the term "sexual harassment." Please help me explore this topic.
Wikipedia has an article, "Slut Shaming":
Slut-shaming is defined by many as a process in which women are attacked for their transgression of accepted codes of sexual conduct, i.e., of admonishing them for behavior or desires that are more sexual than society finds acceptable....Maybe "slut shaming" is mostly done because of the way the person is dressed and the knowledge that she is sexually active, it excludes things like groping and aggressive propositioning, and it does not include the element of pressuring anyone else to provide sex in order to get some non-sex benefit (like a career benefit). It's just a sex-for-sex exchange offered and freely rejectable, without consequences.
ADDED: I'm reading some comments and seeing one key issue. Slut shaming is something women do to other women, because they resent the competition and want to rein in the woman who is perceived as too sexually attractive. You might want to say sexual harassment is different, because the woman who attracts sexual attention doesn't want it and is asking to be defended from it. And yet the other women — the non-attractive — can also complain about sexual harassment. If a superior is offering career advancement if women get sexual with him, the women who don't want to be "sluts" have a grievance. And the woman who is perceived as sexually active and expressive — the "slut" — can inspire other people in the workplace to think she's going to get the advantage that isn't available to me.
That's all very different from what got me started thinking about the question in the post title. I was imagining Harvey Weinstein going on the offensive and saying, You're slut-shaming me! I'm a sexually active, sexually expressive man, and the prudes and the envious are trying to repress me.
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78 comments:
When women do it, it's called sexual politics, i.e, how can I use pussy to get some idiot man to help me get ahead.
If there an age beyond which one cannot be slut-shamed? I recall a lot of it in College. Now? Not much at all.
From experience, slut-shaming is something women do, not men.
Women gossip about this stuff in a hostile manner.
Men are much less hostile, or not at all. It is simply a fact.
Are the actresses who willingly agreed to have sex with Harvey Weinstein to advance their career sluts, and if so, should they be shamed? Do the actresses who refused have the right to criticize those who agreed and advanced?
Slut shaming is shaming by women for making a bad deal. It ruins the market for other women.
So it's okay to tease and entice as long as it's non-physical and non-verbal? I don't think so. Hanging a nude calendar on the wall, or displaying undressed adults on your computer desktop are definitely sexual harassment, and they're both non-physical and non-verbal.
Just read about a billionaire Soros associate accused for raping/beating women in his "Penthouse Dungeon"
Isn't that a contradiction in terms?
Why would women be offended by pictures of nude women.
They're offended by men liking the pictures.
Sexual politics is not a benign act. The women who are willing to prostitute themselves to get what they want gain an advantage over the women of higher moral or ethical makeup; consequently, this type of behavior is more damaging to an organization than mere sexual harassment because it corrupts the entire organization, not just one victim.
"When women do it, it's called sexual politics, i.e, how can I use pussy to get some idiot man to help me get ahead."
Hey watch it with the idiot shaming.
Women are usually not in position of power to sexually harass men, and can usually get a man in bed, without "harassing them".
Plus, few man are physically intimidated by women, unlike the opposite. Also, other than the penis/balls, men have few things you can grab them by. Women have pussy, breasts (2), plus ass.
"Why would women be offended by pictures of nude women."
Plus, jealousy and fat shaming.
@jaydub
It’s like doping in sports. If you let it go unchecked, pretty soon everyone has to choose between doing it or never winning.
I can remember reading years ago a positive article about the sophisticated Diane Sawyer and how adroitly she managed to occasionally flirt with and charm her superiors to advance her career.
"It’s like doping in sports."
Assterisks.
"When women do it, it's called sexual politics, i.e, how can I use pussy to get some idiot man to help me get ahead."
"Hey watch it with the idiot shaming."
Stepping on a lot of toes.
There are always consequences to sex. The effects may be subtle or latent but they are still real. Having supposedly inconsequential sex undermines intimacy and thus changes the context and quality of sexual relationships. Sex is not exclusively a physical act: it's too personal and this personal dimension is strongly present in human nature. The attempt to divide closeness from sex is a loss: you can succeed but at a cost.
Stirring it up a little, Ann?
Beyond Female HS teachers going after male students, I see very little evidence of women sexually harassing men in the work place. More often they torment men with revealing clothing, usually unintentionally.
I have to say I don’t see the overlap. This comes uncomfortably close to recasting Weinstein as a cad instead of an abuser.
Sluts don’t have to coerce men — they meet a man who’s interested and give him what he wants for little effort or expense. Harvey could have slept with dozens or hundreds of women who came on to him, or were easy to persuade, and he’d just be a slut (or whatever we prefer to call the male version, if something else)
Harvey is more like the women who go to male strip clubs and feel entitled to fondle the men. That’s slutty, but it’s also something different and worse.
@Hunter: exactly. That's why it's so destructive. Also, it's a problem that does not have the same visibility or urgency attached to it as does sexual harassment. If a manager gets too aggressive in trying to stop it he may find himself standing in front of the HR VP accused of implying a female employee is a slut. No win situation.
So, let's discuss what is truly important. When is the next female-chauvinist-sponsored Slut Walk?
What must be remembered is that “slut shaming” is something mostly driven by women. It is, essentially, using collective female peer power to control the sexuality of other women in order to reduce competition for mates. This is esp important as women age, they rapidly lose their value in terms of sexual attraction, making them vulnerable to losing their mates to younger, more fertile, women. Think back to high school, and the girls who were supposedly slutty. The guys might play along with their girlfriends and condemn them as such, but then, they are as likely to sneak away and try to get some for themselves on the side. The girls, on the other hand, threatened by the slutty girls sleeping with their guys, use peer pressure to ostracize these girls, controlling the damage.
For a long time, it made little sense to me. From a guy’s point of view, sleeping around for women would seem to be a winning strategy, esp in high school. If winning is considered getting dates, then having a reputation for sexual availability would seem to guarantee a lot of dates - far more than the opposie reputation. The answer was pointed out to me by a young woman in maybe middle school, who pointed out that I didn’t live in “girl world”, with its peer pressures to conform to the group standards. Not having had sisters, I didn’t realize how females socialize differently than males. But the last 30 years, I have spent with women who didn’t socialize well in “girl world”. They have been the ones ostracized. The ones bullied, growing up. And, now decades later, far happier in the company of men, than women. And, yes, “slut shaming” is closely tied to female bullying. Females tend to bully by ostracizing the “other”. That is what I didn’t get, being a guy, where ostracism doesn’t work that well, and bullying tends to be physical, and not relationship based.
@ Meade: shouldn't you be at the craps table?
Maybe it's a phony term for a Leftist and/or feminist weapon to be used offensively or defensively against opponents of the Left and/or political correctness.
Maybe the use of the term an concept varies so widely, and is so logically inconsistent use-to-use that there's no point in trying to pin down a definition nor investigate what the implied definition of the term (implied by how it's used, that is) is a foolish undertaking.
Maybe the actual answer is that "slut-shaming" to the Left just means "bad thing I don't like" in the same way "racist" or "white supremacist" or "homophobe" does and given that the functional evaluation of the term's use will return the same result we always see:
Anything women/Leftist- or feminist-approved groups do is good, praiseworthy, and empowering. Anything men/non Leftist- or feminist-approved groups do is bad, harmful, and ugly.
Just thinking deeply here.
Because women have rights, but men have responsibilities?
Because men are responsible for their actions, but women are just helpless victims?
Inflammatory, degrading and unfair, but I have a suspicion this woman will soon be familiar with the term/.
I'm beginning to wonder whether next year's fashion rage in Hollywood will be twinsets and pearls.
How about the reverse perspective though.
If you’re a Hollywood actress who went through Weinstein and willingly slept with him for favors, and this was known or suspected by other people, would you have a motive to come out and claim you were coerced?
If the choice is between garnering (heh) sympathy as a brave victim, versus people thinking you were a willing prostitute for that fat, gross monster? Here’s where slut shaming would really tie in.
(Please note I’m not suggesting or assuming this is true of any of the accusations. But, it’s a plausible scenario to consider)
If a man talks provocatively, he may be guilty of harassment if the women hearing him (even if they just overheard a private conversation) find it offensive. If a women dresses (acts or talks) provocatively, it's slut shaming to ask her to dress (act or talk) more conservatively. If the men around her find her appearance, words, or actions, distracting, that's their problem. It's worse if any of the men act on her provocative dress, words, or actions by asking her on a date. They should know that she wasn't dressing, speaking, or acting provocatively to attract their attention.
Note: Men are held accountable for knowing how their words or actions affect the women around them. If their words and actions are welcome, there is no harassment. If they are not welcome -- even if most of the women are not offended by what was said or done -- the man is guilty of harassment.
An accusation of "Slut shaming" is a response to accusations of inappropriate behavior.
Harrassment is inappropriate behavior.
Besides that, I don't see a lot of overlap there, not really.
If a woman acts sexually aggressive towards a man that's good--she's "owning her sexuality" and refusing to conform to patriarchal norms of "proper" behavior. You go, girl! Opposing that would be slut-shaming, clearly.
If a man acts sexually aggressive towards a woman that's bad--we don't really have to discuss why. It's creepy and bad and must be harshly punished (even, I guess, if the man stops as soon as the woman first objects). That's harassment, clearly.
Why ask for consistency between the two cases? Why insist that equity and "equal treatment" mean that the two cases should be treated equivalently (in moral or legal terms)? The Left says that any attempt to do so is itself wrong and a symptom of sexism, the patriarchy, etc. That's how you end up with people taking the position that due process is evidence of rape culture.
Feminism demands that women be given equal treatment and equal consideration. Failure to do so is sexism.
Feminism simultaneously demands that women be given better/unequal treatment and special consideration. Failure to do so is sexism.
You cannot reconcile those to premises. Feminism itself is illogical in that sense (Leftist beliefs around race and other topics are, as well) and attempting to apply logic to it will fail.
"Which accusations of sexual harassment are the same thing that has in the past been called "slut shaming"?"
Consistency and emotions have a tenuous relationship. Women have a tendency to let their decisions be influenced more by emotion. This leads to double standards. They are the only standards compatible with emotion based decision making.
Lately though there is a group of men that have taken a liking to the freedom this sort of decision making yields as well. They just haven't figured out how to weaponize it as well as women have.
If a woman in the workforce were to get handsy with the guys, and aggressively proposition them, I think this would be viewed as harassment. I think it would also be viewed as creepy and unhinged and worth a visit to HR. That type of behavior is not the type of behavior people are referring to in the "slut shaming" area. A woman behaving at work in a way that might cause some people to slut-shame her would be wearing sexually provocative clothing and making it clear in one way or another that she is highly active sexually outside of work. I've worked with women like that. It doesn't overlap with sexual harassment (although one woman might exemplify both behaviors).
A man at work behaving in a way that might get him referred to as slutty or trampy (by people who talk like that) behind his back might be...wearing his shirt half-unbuttoned and wearing gold chains or whatever the current "please, please, please think of me sexually" way is for men to dress. He could also attempt to signal that he has a lot of dates. There are ways to do that indicate a certain trampish but non-harassing spirit and ways to do that that could be harassing. I've known men at work who attempt to advertise themselves sexually in these ways and it doesn't cross over into harassment at all.
The difference to me between these two areas:
* One is just kind of pathetic (although fun on Halloween when you are 22)
* The other is threatening or creepy
If you start with a perversion of the terms "fairness" and "equality" you shouldn't be surprised when you results are inconsistent or illogical.
Equality means treating women the same when they want that and giving women special treatment when they want that. If you try to use a dictionary or Wikipedia definition of equality--something like "the same treatment"--to evaluate feminist claims then you'll fail; that's not the definition the feminist is using. Similarly relying on the Wiki definition of slut shaming is a silly--that's not the definition actually meant by most people when they're using the term.
There is a woman I know - major figure in the AZ, one of first woman partners in big firm, big activist, etc.
One day she started ragging ("can you believe her!") on this nice young woman we both knew who had dated/slept (not at same time or overlapping) with several attorneys we also both knew. I asked her if she felt the same way about our mutual gay friend who was going through about the same number/rate of sequential partners. That shut her up.
She was what I call slut-slamming. A lot of women (married or not) find attractive women in their circle who are "promiscuous" to be extremely threatening, at a visceral level. Despite all their so-called tolerance/feminist progressive thinking, cute promiscuous women scare the holy shit out of them.
@HoodlumDoodlum
Not sure this specific topic really warrants the double-standards gripe. Weinstein didn’t just act sexually aggressive, he (allegedly) actually raped some women and threatened others with harm to / destruction of their careeers unless they had sex with him. Two completely different things.
Now, I fully believe there are a lot more women who would apologize for a woman who behaved this way toward men; and more women who would disbelieve and belittle the male victims, also, compared to how men are reacting to Weinstein. But I think the vast majority of men and women would not be accepting of it from a man or a woman.
Leslie Graves said... A woman behaving at work in a way that might cause some people to slut-shame her would be wearing sexually provocative clothing and making it clear in one way or another that she is highly active sexually outside of work. I've worked with women like that. It doesn't overlap with sexual harassment
Criticizing a woman who dressing in an (inappropriately) sexually suggestive manner would be slut shaming. Criticizing a man dressing in an (inappropriately) sexually suggestive manner would be reporting harassment. A woman "expressing her sexuality" is cheered on and celebrated. A man "expressing his sexuality" may find himself at the wrong end of a lawsuit or on the run from a mob.
You can't really argue "it doesn't overlap with sexual harassment" when most cases of workplace harassment are "hostile environment" cases that involve behavior/patterns of behavior that don't include direct propositions/quid pro quo and the like. You are defining sexual harassment too narrowly (more narrowly than the law does, certainly) and reaching an invalid conclusion on that basis.
Look, it's a double standard. It's self-evidently a double standard. Trying to apply the logic of a single standard to a situation where there's a double standard guarantees failure.
Hunter said...Not sure this specific topic really warrants the double-standards gripe. Weinstein didn’t just act sexually aggressive, he (allegedly) actually raped some women and threatened others with harm to / destruction of their careeers unless they had sex with him. Two completely different things.
If we were in any way talking about Weinstein you would have a really solid point there. We are not, though, so you don't.
Slut shaming was one of the primary defenses used by Hillary's "Bimbo Erruption Squad" (Good times... good times.) against Bill's women. Garage even repeated a particularly horrendous example concerning Paula Jones when he used to post here.
Seems to me that there should be some feminist analysis out there that (more coherently than me) can distinguish this as arising from the power differentials between men and women, in situations where either is seen as transgresses accepted norms of sexual behavior, i.e., someone who is clearly more powerful/threat (a man) is a harasser if he presumes to (mis)use that power to get/coerce some sort of benefit that he would otherwise not have; whereas a woman is seen as a "slut" if she presumes to (mis)use her body to coerce/trap some benefit that she would otherwise not have. Or something.
In college, there was the famous "walk of shame" on Sorority row.
On Sunday mornings, between 7:00 and 9:00 am, you'd see several attractive, but somewhat disheveled females, returning to their sorority houses after a night of unmentionables.
This was all in good fun, I recall mild teasing, but no huge stigmas.
College was 35 years ago -- the pleasant interlude between high school and the grinding world of work.
The man has nothing of value to defend, he's just getting what he wants.
The woman is presumed to have something of value that she can offer to her eventual mate and ought not to squander.
The man wants to be the woman's first partner, the woman wants to be the man's last.
Old rules.
The "workplace" used to be a male environment, which women entered on sufferance and on male terms. A woman who was not careful in her dealings with men was regarded as asking for it, and no one was surprised when she got it. Women have successfully lobbied to alter that situation, to the great detriment of men. Behavior which was perfectly acceptable when there were no women around is now cause for firing. But women still feel free to use their sexuality as a tool and a weapon. There is no possible "remedy" for this, because it is not practical to prevent sexual relations in the workplace. It is simply another in the long list of situations where women demand to have it both ways.
"An accusation of "Slut shaming" is a response to accusations of inappropriate behavior. Harrassment is inappropriate behavior...."
You're messing up the equation, which is:
Accusation of sexual harassment = slut shaming.
You put the word "accusation" on the wrong side and the idea become almost nonsensical.
Let's say X is the label-user and Y is the person who is doing some sexual behaving and expressing.
X might accuse Y of sexual harassment or shame Y as a slut.
My question in the post title is: When does X have both options? Also: When does X choose option 1 (accusing sexual harassment) because X thinks it's good to control sexual harassment but wrong to slut-shame? Then: In those instances, Y would be able to retort: You're slut-shaming me!
That's what I'm trying to home in on.
"If a man talks provocatively, he may be guilty of harassment if the women hearing him (even if they just overheard a private conversation) find it offensive. If a women dresses (acts or talks) provocatively, it's slut shaming to ask her to dress (act or talk) more conservatively. If the men around her find her appearance, words, or actions, distracting, that's their problem."
What about Harvey Weinstein getting into his bathrobe?
How about comparing women who dehumanize men by comparing bank accounts. Why isn't the hunt and pursuit for a wealthy man considered the same kind of predatory techniques? When women treat men as a commodity by savoring their bank accounts; is that not just as craven and reprobate as anything Weinstein did?
What about shaming old powerful rich male pedophiles with D's behind their names?
No way - must cover. Bulletproof, and all that.
>You put the word "accusation" on the wrong side and the idea become almost nonsensical.
Sorry, but I don't agree.
If I accuse a woman of, e.g., dressing inappropriately for work, I am "slut-shaming." Then someone else can accuse me of slut-shaming.
There is no "wrong" side for "accusation" because both sides are accusing.
buwaya: From experience, slut-shaming is something women do, not men.
Women gossip about this stuff in a hostile manner.
Men are much less hostile, or not at all. It is simply a fact.
Men don't bad-mouth women who sleep around? Nonsense. Of course they do.
Now, an old-school gentleman would not trash-talk about a woman, regardless of his personal opinion of her. But for that matter, neither would an old-school lady. From experience, among the people I've told to put a sock in it and mind their own business, the men outnumber the women. (Maybe the women just knew better than to talk that way around me and carried on out of my earshot.)
The real difference I've observed is that, if you tell a woman who's a nasty little gossip that she's a nasty little gossip, she'll just flounce off, apparently entirely unchastened. Tell a man who's being a nasty little gossip that he's a nasty little gossip...it stings. He sulks off, and is, I suspect, at least a wee bit chastened. (I mean the regular men here, not the viperish Tituses of the world.)
@assrat
You're wrong because the accusation is that the person is a slut, not that the person is slut-shaming. The accuser is the shamer.
To accuse someone of slut-shaming would equate with shaming someone for making an accusation of sexual harassment.
Please look at my description of X and Y above to get the equation correct.
Peter said...
I'm beginning to wonder whether next year's fashion rage in Hollywood will be twinsets and pearls.
11/3/17, 12:07 PM
Rigid corsets and chastity belts (or maybe burkas). Harvey can't commit rape if he can't get to the "goodies".
There it is! The left is "in bed" with Islam because lefty men have just as much self-control as the men that practice the religion of peace?
"Men don't bad-mouth women who sleep around?"
Not in my experience.
They certainly would mention it, but there would be no particular malice in it.
Women known to "sleep around" may also be identified as more approachable and even influential.
Paradoxical, I know.
Ann Althouse said...
"My question in the post title is: When does X have both options?"
Well, of course, women always want it both ways. And they generally get what they want. A man's sexual display is not considered an invitation, it is considered an imposition. It is sexual harassment. But a man is not even supposed to notice a woman's sexual display, unless she wants him to. A woman can stick her tits in your face and get mad at you for staring. If a man sticks his crotch in your face he's fired.
There is a logic, Althouse, and it isn't hard to see. The difficulty you are having is that the logic turns upon the proposition that women are delicate creatures in need of protection. You want the protection, but you don't want to acknowledge the weakness that requires it.
>You're wrong because the accusation is that the person is a slut, not that the person is slut-shaming
Your claim is that two people cannot accuse one another of different things? That sounds very odd to me.
Jack can accuse Jill of stealing. Jill can accuse Jack of lying. Which part is incomprehensible?
I say we think of the sexual suggestion games among those in the entertainment workplace as an Olympic Penthalon event. Each performs all 10 contests and has points awarded against the world record. The women have to run fast over many hurdles and over the long distance while the men have to shoot their putt, spear with their javelin and have flings with their discus. The most points wins a free one year marriage complete with affairs and a quickie divorce and their choice of an illegitimate baby or as many abortions as necessary.
Worried About Being A Slut
Ann writes: ". . . because the odds are so much less that a man will feel physically threatened by a woman."
I was surprised to learn that apparently that may not be the case. Thus from a recent article in Scientific American:
"The results were surprising. For example, the CDC’s nationally representative data revealed that over one year, men and women were equally likely to experience nonconsensual sex, and most male victims reported female perpetrators. Over their lifetime, 79 percent of men who were “made to penetrate” someone else (a form of rape, in the view of most researchers) reported female perpetrators. Likewise, most men who experienced sexual coercion and unwanted sexual contact had female perpetrators."
https://goo.gl/LrDXXJ
re: slut shaming -- I thought it was Evolutionary Psychology 101 that women who sleep around lose their appeal to men as potential marriage partners. Guys want to know the children of the women they marry are genetically theirs.
When the woman is the one with the power, and outweighs the man by maybe 50 pounds, I will consider the parallel between slut shaming and calling out sexual harassment.
And, I am waiting for the first woman to break the ice on lesbian sex harassment--it's out there, and a lot. The first woman to come out with that will have to be VERY brave, though, she will have the whole socially liberal world against her (unless the alleged aggressor is a Republican, of course). Which is why no one may come forward.
I'm getting to the who cares WGAF stage about all this. Weinstein has and had it coming, but I'm beginning to think I'm seeing a widespread hysterical sort of Salem Witch Trial.
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but weren't the words actor and actress synonymous with the word prostitute back in the swinging 980s?
I'm just waiting now for someone on Game O' Thrones to complain about being groped.
I once worked with a woman who always wore low-cut blouses that showed an amazing amount of her ample cleavage... and then who complained when men didn't look her in the eye. Duh!
I've also been in a work environment, back when I was in my mid-20s and very fit, where a 40s woman kept calling me 'cutie pie' and asking me to come and help her with her computer... and making it very clear that she'd like some help after hours. Was that sexual harassment? I blew it off, just as I imagine a lot of women blow off men being overtly obvious with their come-ons.
Unwelcome sexual advances are a part of the mating ritual... people ask and the people they ask either indicate positive or negative interest. I think sexual harassment is when people keep asking even if they've been rejected. Should boorish behavior be illegal? If so, most of humanity would be behind bars. I think you cross the line when you touch. No one has the right to touch others when it's not wanted. So, letting people know that you're not interested should be enough, and when it's not a bit of advice from another coworker should be enough... and then you bring in HR. But women can't claim to be equal and snowflakes at the same time.
How 'bout if people just behave like ladies and gentlemen, and let it go at that? Most people know what that means, and there's always Miss Manners.
Voltaire quipped that ladies tremble at hearing of certain things, though they do not hesitate to do them. Althouse refers sideways to the phenomenon while making a related point about women's behaviors.
I think Weinstein should have responded as Althouse presents in her final sentence.
"When the woman is the one with the power"
Like when she gets away with padding her expenses by $500 per week by filing a harassment complaint on the project manager who stopped approving them? Been there seen that.... multiple times. It was cheaper to put up with it than go to the trouble of fighting it.
Ann Althouse said...What about Harvey Weinstein getting into his bathrobe?
Weinstein getting into his bathrobe with a woman who wasn't dependent on him for work (a job, a shot at fame, etc) would just be provocative dress. Even doing that to/against a person with much less power than him--if that's all he did--could probably be excused as just a VERY bad example of sexual expression. But that's not all he did and using him as an example of your general idea probably obscures much more than it reveals.
The Andy Dick example (no force, awkward passes that might have included too much physical touch, not targeting people who need him for work,etc) is by far the better one to use.
Ill-defined terms are elastic, and people try to inflict the greatest amount of damage while being taken at face value for their statements, while claiming maximum damage for the smallest offense from others. All very Screwtape. Women of my/your generation can gin up some sympathy for those called sluts by pretending that "it's all the same as when people thought I was a slut for sleeping with my steady." There are attempts to valorise the accused as if those are merely trying to assert new female space.
It's not really about sexual behavior at all for them. Sex is just the court they are playing this racquetball on.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/what-on-earth-was-michelle-obama-trying-to-say-about-men/article/2639596
Is Michelle attempting "slut shaming"? Or harassing ?
"...x has both options?" In the same forum? Or different fora?
Both = not mutually exclusive.
Option = choose one or other
First time I ever heard about this idiocy was years ago when some girl I sort of knew very stupidly posted a picture of herself. Publicly on the internet. In skimpy underwear. She made sure to include the #noslutshaming and #bold tags.
If you've dated women, you understand what's going on here. 1. Not responsible for any bad decisions or mistakes. 2. Super strong and independent. 3. This is all really your fault.
It would be like me getting wasted, barfing in the hostas and passing out on your lawn. #nodrunkshaming
"Harvey Weinstein going on the offensive and saying, You're slut-shaming me! I'm a sexually active, sexually expressive man, and the prudes and the envious are trying to repress me."
I'm not following, what would this excuse have to do with the response to the credible allegations that he raped numerous women? implying it would complicate the narrative in the public response and liberals in particular would roll over with this response
is very facile thought.
You might want to say sexual harassment is different, because the woman who attracts sexual attention doesn't want it and is asking to be defended from it. And yet the other women — the non-attractive — can also complain about sexual harassment.
Well, this is nonsense.
If a man has a picture of his wife in a bikini in his cubicle, he can be charged with sexual harassment? Is the wife going to get a promotion? Is the wife being held as some icon of female professional conduct? Is the man pimping out his wife?
No! But Blolivia is reminded what she...well...never was and feels sad. So it is the man's fault. Even though there is no quid pro quo
Phil tells Bill a joke about a blonde having to take a breathalyzer test constantly. Shrillary is walking by. She is not the target of the joke. No woman in the company is a target of the joke. But these men may very well be packing their personal items because Shrillary doesn't like the ideas of women giving blowjobs.
A male only shop has a picture of Rambi on their wall, carrying a large machine gun and in a camo bikini. Is Rambi part of the code of conduct manual? Is she stealing a job from the women who aren't even in the shop?
No. But she reminds women that men adulate and reward women who make them happy. And making men happy seems to be anti-ethical for professional women these days.
Frankly, these 'sluts' are raising the bar for all women by taking extra care in their appearance, by using EFFECTIVE social skills, by trying to get positive responses from men with practically no effort...and the other women hate her SO DAMN MUCH for these minimal efforts.
Sexual harassment has become a catch all phrase for 'anything women don't like' and men have recognized this fact...and resent the putative nature of the laws abusing men for liking pretty women or sex in any form
A lot of sloppy definitions here.
Men do not 'slut shame'.
WOMEN slut shame.
Men 'bitch shame'.
Because the difference between a slut and a bitch is that a slut will sleep with anyone. A bitch will sleep with anyone but you...ergo...
Sorry: Antithetical
As my contracts professor at Notre Dame, the late great Ed Murphy said, "There is no such thing as free sex." Boy, is he ever being proved right of late.
John Clifford said...
"But women can't claim to be equal and snowflakes at the same time."
John, John. How often must I say it. There are two intertwined schools of feminism. The more virulent is the man-haters, hard-core lesbians or asexual. They abhor men and all our works, and would rather the world not contain any. They are few, but they are the backbone of academic feminism.
Then there are the vastly more common women who often find men annoying, difficult or frightening, but are still attracted to us, and wish to associate with at least some of us. And to them, "feminism" means precisely "having it both ways" or rather, as Sheryl Sandberg puts it, "having it all". Having your cake, eating it too, while someone else pays for it, and you don't gain an ounce. With ice cream, and they take your picture with the fork in your hand, and you look ravishing! Your hair is perfect, your dress drapes just so, and a hint of a superior smile plays upon your lips. Feminism! Doesn't it sound grand? Me for some of that! Well, maybe not. Feminism isn't for everybody.
There's no male term for 'slut', just like there's no female term for 'bum'.
Life--REAL life--is asymmetrical that way.
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