#because they think any an all attraction to a woman is a patriarchal dehumanization.

[canichangemyblogname]

⚠️ IMAGE TW: Suicidal Ideation

These posts are by the same TERF, who is subjecting herself to personal conversion “therapy.” I have blocked out the username because this individual is clearly not well. And, yes, “not well” here clearly refers to the individual’s suicidal ideation. (Yes, I reported this threat of self-harm to Tumblr.)

In the gender-critical case against trans inclusion, structural subordination on the basis of sex dominates the discussion to the virtual exclusion of anything else. That's not to say there's no such thing as a male dominant society. I would never claim that just the same I would NEVER claim there's no such thing as a white supremacist society.

This is more a commentary on two things: the presupposition of social hierarchies in the ideological investments in structural oppression and structuralist frameworks that gender-crits care deeply about as well as the lack of engagement with intersectional frameworks.

Ideological investments in the structural oppression gender-crits care deeply about has led them to presuppose the validity of the frameworks they're using to interpret this structural oppression rather than take their validity as a hypothesis. This presupposition can lead one to miss noticing other things that are going on, especially things that just can’t, and probably should not, be forced into the explanatory frameworks gender-crits use to interpret structural oppression.

—The Feminist Philosopher, here on Tumblr

The above 👆 observation is often brought forth in critiques of how Exclusionarism fails to consider the intersection of womanhood and race, often to the detriment of Black women in feminist movements. It’s an intersectional critique of what is ultimately, at its core, nothing more than a reactionary anti-intersectional movement. But this critique of Exclusionarism is broadly applicable to other intersections that it also fails to consider, as “intersections produce more complex, shifting, and context-dependent power relationships than are captured by [a simple, binary] M > F formula.”

Exclusionarism considers only sexism to the detriment of analyzing heterosexism and cissexism, and that is on full display in the featured photos. Gender *is* socially constructed (“a product of culture”), that is very true. The bounds of proper gender, however, aren’t only defined by sexism, but also things like racism, heterosexism, and cissexism. So, a TER’s analysis always fails to consider how it’s not just misogyny, but also homophobia and transphobia that socially construct our sex caste system. One’s assigned sex caste is not informed simply by whether or not a child has a dick, but by how well the attending doctor thinks the child will perform a certain role in heterosexual sex and heterosexual reproduction (this is the excuse often made for performing genital surgeries on intersex infants).

“Sex is [] a very unstable category that people can disrupt in many ways even without an explicit trans identity, because patriarchy is a natalist, heterosexual regime oriented around reproduction as much as around male-supremacy… [A]ll forms of gender-marginalization are at their root a disruption of heterosexuality.” —taliabhattwrites, here on Tumblr**

“Some areas in biology still refer to behaviours as sex characteristics. the whole idea of the ‘invert’ category was the idea that gays and transes were ‘doing sex backwards,’ and ‘doing the wrong sex.’ … This wasn't about a biological scientific test, and it wasn't just about coitus; it was about not fitting into a binary system of social behaviours and activities that connect to sexual behaviours… sex was both what we did, who we did it with, how we did it, and who we were.” —braindamagebaeddel, here on Tumblr

“Rather, this is an explication of the underlying root of patriarchy, its core mechanisms and systems that constitute the guiding principles of (trans)misogyny, lesbophobia-all instances of gender-marginalization. Sex is not quite as binary as advertised, because the heterosexual regime has always regarded people as one of human, broodmare, or freak. If you are not a person with autonomy, then you are a vessel for those who are ... and if you cannot even be that, then you are a waste of flesh, something to be fucked, killed, or both… The butch derided and beaten as a delusional ‘he-she,’ the tranny who can be endlessly violated, and even the woman who merely refuses to have children, are bound by this commonality. If we cannot participate in reproduction, we must be fixed… or disposed of.” —taliabhattwrites, here on Tumblr

So, someone saying, “No, I reject that” in whatever capacity, whether it’s being trans or being a lesbian or simply refusing to have sex and children, *is* radical, and not a conformance to the sex caste system *or* stereotypes. The patriarchy wants a woman to be classed as female, and clearly distinguishable as so to make her and keep her opposite that a man. Patriarchal ideas and actors do everything to convince someone to maintain a sex’s “naturally ordained” sphere of biodestiny, right down to convincing you that sex is immutable, trans is wrong, and you need a dick to be a man.

Because the OOP is right about one thing, being a man is not about having any one kind of body. Wanting is enough.

“The standards by which I can be trans and be a man are determined by a cissexist understanding of sex. And that is never more clear than in the questionnaires that shrinks give patients to “determine” if one truly has “transgender.” They will interrogate whether the patient acts in a manner “stereotypical” of the sex they were NOT assigned at birth, a concept so very loaded with patriarchal, anti-feminist, and anti-trans assumptions.” [SOURCE]

Not considering cissexism is one fundamental flaw in a TER’s “feminist” analysis. It always has been. This intentional “oversight” leads to an overwhelmingly cissexual understanding of gender diversity. TER’s are capable of only seeing transness through stereotypes and a very binary, hierarchal, and segregated lens, where “men are men, women are women, and never the twain shall meet.” They refuse to consider the way variance outside the traditional definitional bounds of our sex castes is also punished and pathologized by society. They insist on seeing transness as something that upholds the strict caste system rather than something that aids in breaking down their dichotomy of fucked and fucker in a heterosexual regime. And they do this—as well as refuse to consider the intersectional hypothesis—to avoid analyzing how they reinscribe themselves into the dramas of cissexuality, and thus uphold a foundational tenent of the patriarchy: oppositional sexism.

Trans people aren’t the only ones with socially constructed genders. Cis is not an “more natural” gender by virtue of administrative caste assignment at birth.*** Trans is not “the mind that needs fixing” while cis is “perfect in every way.” Trans is not “mutilation” while cis is “natural and whole.” It is cissexism, too, that treats transness as hysteria and simply a “feeling” with no basis in reality. Gender literally is a social construct, so that “idea in your head” can be as much a man as a woman as nothing in particular at all, so long as you want it. Because wanting *is* enough. OOP never needed “fixing,” and other gender diverse people don’t, either.

You can do something about your suicidality. You can be happy. You can be yourself. You don’t have to have everything figured out. You can remain complex and vague. Don’t die wondering.

**It is important to note here that I believe that Radical Feminist thought is, at its foundation, transphobic, colonial, and Zionist-sympathetic. So, I do not believe that it can be re-appropriated from a transphobic hate movement into something which can meaningfully fight for trans liberation or women, and break down things like western patronism and chauvinism. I do not think that the movement is separable from its history of things like anti-blackness or from thinkers like Mary Daly, Shelia Jeffries, Julie Bindel, or Janice Raymond. The fact radical feminism is so widely transphobic (also racist and misogynistic) is not a fluke; it is rooted in the philosophy’s fallacies and frequent use of essentialism. Today’s average rad fem is not a “misbegotten” inheritor, but the movement’s direct ideological descendent.

***And gender—much like sexuality—being socially constructed does not make it any less significant or real as part of sociocultural systems and identities. TERs often utilize an ad naturam fallacy to talk about social constructs, operating from the idea that there is some non-socially constructed default (natural state) from which we all originate. A sort of… state of nature, if you will. As a social species, there exists no system that is not socially constructed; even the hermit is constructed in relation to society. We should be analyzing a system on its merits, considering the social mores we wish to value, not whether it is “the most natural,” where we presuppose “naturalness” as inherently good.

“All women feel gender dysphoria. You aren’t trans; you’ve just been alienated from your reproductive labor. I used to feel this way too, and then I got over it!”

No baby, they don’t. Most cis women do not feel gender dysphoria. You also don’t simply “get over it.” Like— half your blog is dedicated to how miserable you are and the other half to calling trans women “moids.” You are having a very normal experience— gender dysphoria— that you have demonized and abnormalized. Your behavior is not a rational reaction to the way you feel about your body. You hate the way you feel, you hate what this would mean for your place in larger society, and you are externalizing this, blaming your “bad thoughts” on “Jewish Doctors” and “Transgenderism” and “Hysteria” (social contagion) because your catholic background taught you that your only worth is in using your “womb” to create more (white) babies. For the love of fuck— just go to therapy.

[doberbutts]

Hey thank you for posting about gay/trans men’s experiences. It’s really interesting to see a whole other side of the lgbtq experience(I’m a queer cis female). Honestly it has made me realize that I have been guilty of saying all men except trans men, which is not great.

Yeah it's... really not.

There are a fair number of straight white men who have been victimized, attacked, assaulted... and they are just as deserving of a space to process their trauma and talk about how they have been negatively impacted, without people constantly going UMMMM SWEATIE....... YOUR PRIVILEGE at them.

And, besides that, by saying 'all men..... except trans men' you are effectively saying you do not consider trans men to be real men. If they pass. If they don't pass. If they are stealth. If they are visible. If they date men. If they date women. Pre op. Post op. If they were raised with female conditioning. If they weren't.

You lump us all into a category, and that category is 'men who are not men but we call them men to not hurt their feelings'. And it sucks!!! Every time I see someone do that, that is what it says to me. It's transphobic. It's homophobic. And it hurts ALL men, because when you paint all men as dangerous predators, you don't just shame vulnerable men back into their respective closets. You also tell men who you do not consider vulnerable that they are nothing more than predators and abusers that must apologize every day for their existence.

Men have absolutely been responsible for some very shitty things in this world. So have women.

I am black, trans, gay, and disabled. One of the most dangerous groups for me to interact with is white women. Historically, they are who call the lynch mob to get people like me killed for the sin of walking on the same sidewalk. In present day, I see an awful lot of white feminists and white wlw protest the Karen stereotype. Despite that very real danger that white women present to me, if I were to say that women are trash or that all women need to suck it up and apologize for what happened to men like Emmitt Till and do better before I'm willing to reconsider, if I judged you all by the Karen stereotype that only exists as a stereotype BECAUSE OF THE DANGER TO BLACK PEOPLE... you know exactly what would happen.

Remember that beside every plantation owner stood a white woman who saw no problem with her husband beating and raping and torturing my people.

Remember that it was white women who weaponized their whiteness and their percieved frailty within their patriarchal roles to demonize, dehumanize, and murder black men.

Remember that it was white women who excluded black people and especially black wlw from the face of women's rights, who told them that the movement was not for them, who told them that they would have to wait their turn, who turned their backs on their sisters when race came into play.

Remember that it was a pair of white lesbians who paraded that adopted black boy around when black lives matter started, who forced him to hug the police he was very afraid of, who beat and abused and starved him and the rest of their adopted black kids. Who drove off a fucking cliff with all of them in the car and we still have not found his body.

But men are dismissed and silenced for protesting the double standard, and if I sound angry it's because I am. I'm not angry at /speficially you/. I am not angry at queer women. I'm not angry at white women. I am not angry at any woman. I understand that there are bad people of every creed color gender sexuality race religion and more. But I AM angry that every time this comes up, what happens is that men are told their lives are perfect and easy and they have unconditional privilege and the world is as safe as can be for them.

Where was Devonte Hart's safety when his adoptive white lesbian mothers murdered him? Where was his privilege when they poisoned the court case against his birth mother, who desperately wanted her children back? When was his life of being taken from his birth mother and then tortured at the hands of people OUR GOVERNMENT allowed him to be in supposed to be perfect and easy?

We will never know if Devonte was queer. We will never know what type of man he would turn out to be.

His life was still precious. He wasn't trash. And he was murdered by queer women after they realized they'd no longer get away with torturing him.

I don't hate queer women. I count quite a few among my friends, and they are just as appalled at the situation as I was. They are just as disgusted by this attitude as I am. But I am tired of being told that it is solely my gender that is the problem, and that anyone attracted to men must have something wrong with them. And I am angry that I have to explain how not only is 'all men... but not trans men' is such a terrible line of thinking.

That boy did not deserve the fate he got, even if he would have grown up to be straight. And it wasn't men who hurt him, either.

[knarme-stray]

There are so many ways in which cis women enforce patriarchy or push gender roles onto people. Here are just some examples I can think of...

Policing the autonomy of fellow women; anti-abortionist women, conservative women in general pushing a certain kind of femininity on everyone, "correcting" other women to "act like a lady"

Socially excluding fat, neurodivergent, queer, gender-nonconforming, trans etc. women

Pushing misogynistic beauty standards onto other women

Degendering and masculinizing racialized women and all kinds of trans people to vilify / predatorjacket them

Forcing womanhood onto (C)AFAB people who are not women, such as TERFs manipulating nonbinary and transmasculine individuals into closeting or detransitioning

Using misogynistic beauty standards to shame and dehumanize AFAB trans people's bodies when they transition, like use HRT

Enforce toxic masculinity by shaming queer and gender-nonconforming men, or using femininity as an insult to men as it's a bad thing if a man is feminine

Exclusionist radfem cis lesbians treating other women as property that can be "ruined" (often they also abuse transmascs and men into staying in closet like this)

The sheer amount of straight women who'll mistreat another woman over a man

Trans people of any kind, and cis women, are not to be singled out as particularly bad feminists in a world where misogyny and cisheterosexism is everywhere to begin with.

I do think that trans people, fem or masc alike, - get (incorrectly) accused of being particularly man-adjancent / threatening by radfems. As a transmasculine person I deeply empathize with transfem folk whose life experiences are incorrectly assumed and negatively stereotyped by transmisogynistic cis women.

When radfem-minded people want to single out a demographic of marginalized gender expressions as "man-adjacent / malebrained / particularly threatening", it is so that particularly traditionally feminine cis white women can protect their status and presumed innocence, allowing them to perpetuate white supremacy and cisheterosexism unchecked.

No trans people anywhere benefit from these gender-essentialist politics where people's "safety" or "toxicitiy" is measured in their proximity to conventionally attractive, white perisex cishet women.

There have been politically detransitioned transmascs and assimilationist transfems perpetuating these radfem politics against fellow trans people, and both are basically bootlicking the patriarchy in doing so.

.... Another note... I personally do find that the average trans person of any gender, just in my experience, is a better feminist than most cis women. Particularly because trans people are like canaries in the coalmine when it comes to gender equality. Our fates are particularly brutal whenever social conservatism around gender worsens. We're the ones who disappear first, because we deviate so strongly from patriarchal gender roles.

I feel that a lot of cishet women, particularly white ones, aren't used to being seen as threatening or as capable of harm. Way too much "responsibility for the patriarchy" is piled onto trans people who have the least power in upholding it, who so easily become some of the most brutalized victims of it at the hands of it, be it about being predatorjacketed or "put into one's place" for daring to claim something cis men think they own.

Yes, everyone's got their work to do unpacking things. No group of people is inherently safe.

Just saying that trans people get a disproportionate amount of shit for existing and are often turned into that easy, socially acceptable punching bag for cis women's patriarchy-resentments.

do trans women need to unlearn patriarchal structures and moral values in order to be good feminists? yessir 100%

but don’t do cis women as well?

you’re not automatically a good feminist because you were born with ovaries, and your opinions are not automatically right and worth listening to because of your cishood.

we are all learning, and being a biological female™️ does not make you exempt of having to learn as well.

we all need to collectively do better!

[duaneodavila]

Yancy Is Right, He Is “Sexist”

Everybody wants to be a hashtag hero, and Emory philosophy professor George Yancy is no exception. So he’s come up with a cool new hashtag and the powers of truth and justice at the New York Times have given him the real estate to promote it.

Men, listen up.

In light of a year of disturbing revelations from the #MeToo movement and from last month’s profoundly troubling Brett Kavanaugh hearings and his eventual confirmation to the Supreme Court, it is time that we, men, act.

Certainly, some of us men have spoken out on behalf of women. But many more of us have remained silent. Some have kept silent out of fear of being judged, fear of criticism or censure, others out of genuine respect. In fact, silence has become the default stance of many men who consider themselves “allies” of women. But given all that has transpired, staying out of it is no longer enough.

I’ve decided not to cut corners. So, join me, with due diligence and civic duty, and publicly claim: I am sexist!

And so . . . wait for it . . .

In fact, perhaps it is time that we lay claim to a movement — #IamSexist. Think about its national and international implications as we take responsibility for our sexism, our misogyny, our patriarchy.

Think about it? Fair enough. Let’s begin with the “men, listen up” opening. Who, George, are you to seek our attention? A lot of people these days seem to believe they’re entitled to other people’s attention because whatever they have to say is so important, so true, that it must be heard.

Most of them are children who have been reared on the misguided belief that their opinion matters. After all, mommy said so. They’re teachers said so. All the grown-ups around them have rubbed their tummies and told them their opinion deserved respect for no other reason than it was their opinion.

But you, George? You’re supposed to be an adult. You’re a professor. Granted, philosophy, but still. Is there a reason why your opinion is of greater value than any other adults? Are you the leader of the Men Tribe? Was there an election and nobody told me?

So if you’re nobody special, nobody whose opinion others inherently gravitate toward, seek out because you’re a “thought leader” among males, then perhaps it’s the strength of your argument that will sway others to use your hashtag.

Some have kept silent out of fear of being judged, fear of criticism or censure, others out of genuine respect.

Perhaps that��s true, but your list of reasons for men not joining your sleepover party may miss a few things. Some of us don’t blubber for sad, weak, downtrodden women, who need men as their allies, their white knights, their saviors, because they are so fragile, so delicate, so pathetic, that they cannot manage without the firm hand of a strong man. Some of us think that women are our equals, or at least can be if that’s what they choose to be. Some of us don’t think they need our acquiescence if not assistance in allowing them to be equal.

And some of us think that men (you remember us, the people you tell to “listen up”?) get to be men just as women get to be women.

We have heard many accounts from women of what it is like to live under the yoke of our self-serving construction of a violent, pathetic and problematic masculinity. It is time that we stop gaslighting their reality.

In your world, George, women are “gaslighted” by the overwhelming power of your toxic masculinity. You are so strong, so hard, so powerful, that women collapse under your gaze. You’re such a he-man, George. Women wilt in your patriarchal presence.

If you are a woman reading this, I have failed you. Through my silence and an uninterrogated collective misogyny, I have failed you. I have helped and continue to help perpetuate sexism. I know about how we hold onto forms of power that dehumanize you only to elevate our sense of masculinity. I recognize my silence as an act of violence. For this, I sincerely apologize.

You should apologize, George. Not because your “silence” is an “act of violence,” a nonsensical assertion if ever there was one. Not because of your “uninterrogated collective misogyny,” if that’s what it’s called in your sad delusions. And certainly not for seeing a pretty women and being attracted to her. That’s kinda how our species has managed to perpetuate itself.

No, George, you are not “innocent.” Yes, George, you need to apologize because you are, most assuredly, sexist. You think you matter, whether to men or women. You think men should lay down their masculinity because you issue a “clarion call.” You think women give a shit about how you feel, as if their equality somehow depended on George’s tears. You think it’s somehow about you.

I know that if you are a woman, you don’t really need me as a man saying to you that you are not paranoid when it comes to male violence, sexual and otherwise. I speak not for you but with you.

You speak for no one but yourself, George. And whether anybody wants to speak with you is up to them. You have no say in the matter.

[hiriajuu-suffering]

My views on Heteronormative Feminism are...problematic?

I didn’t used to think this way, I used to think men and women were morally equal, that generally both genders had the same conceptions for happiness. Having gone through almost 90% of my 20s, I can’t feel the same. I’m unable to feel the same. I’m totally numb to feminine experience because it garners no empathy of giving value to others intrinsically. While I think toxic femininity is a direct result of patriarchal norms, ultimately, feminism itself champions these negative traits rather than highlight them as repercussions of the patriarchy.

Women don’t find men attractive beyond what they can provide. Women don’t want men, they want the additional 22% average earnings a man makes to be taken away from the man they’re with and be given (most likely unearned) to them. Women don’t want sex with men, they’re driven by the biological need for sperm to reproduce to think they want men but are nurtured into thinking women are more attractive than men, thereby making it such that their attraction to any masculinity outside of a normative conception be nullified. Women don’t like men, the natural tendency for any pending issue in their lives is diverting blame to those in power instead of taking responsibility. Women don’t treat men as equals, men’s social opinions are automatically deemed lesser due to what male privilege provides (though female privilege affords basic things social instincts like interacting with children and acknowledging feelings) whilst adding toxic masculinity to the act of sex itself by assuming men are devoid of attachment oxytocin.

Women are Hobbesian, men are Lockean. I’m, of course, referring to state of nature theories here. Men’s desire to promote conflict and strife for the advance of power/status is a direct result of what the women said men desire and the perceived deficits women have of a men. Why are all the shortest dictators in history the most violent? Why is one of the largest postmodern marketing tropes about penis size (arguably eclipsing cup size)? Why do men prioritize their physical appearance (meathead culture) in a contrast where the feminine narrative is body positivity? Why don’t we talk about how men feel and why men (not just attempting) killing themselves at higher rates? A woman can rightfully feel fulfilled by simply being a parent, but a man has to be a good parent, professional, provider, lover, advisor, counselor, and source of emotional support all in one. It doesn’t matter what’s in a woman’s bank account to anyone, but it always matters what’s in a man’s bank account to a woman. A woman is a more attractive public figure because men flock to her, a man can’t fly through the roof in the same way because masculinity caps at normativity (hence why women pull more than 70% of the views on twitch/youtube while being less than 10% of the content base and having a generally lesser level of expertise in their target niche).

Our crossroads is heteronormative femininity gets every social advantage imaginable which systemic barriers remain in place in which men get punished for. Feminism shouldn’t be at the expense of men, any decent feminist should tell you this. Yet, frankly, it most often is. OnlyFans culture is the exploitation of men’s desirability complexes, the model itself doesn’t function when you ask women to pay to see men at that level of intimacy (and no, that has nothing to do with the wage gap). Women have a unique advantage of having the option to sell their body, labor, or mind; men can practically only sell their labor with a small possibility of their mind. The unavailability for a man to sell ones body professionally means while men “get paid more on average,” they will always have less opportunity because society will always pick a woman first. Heck, if we were to take the wage gap literally, it’s economically advantageous to pay equal work for 82% of its worth, meaning women have more opportunity to partake in occupational freedom holistically. Alimony and child support law is a relic of patriarchal norms all feminism ignores for its own benefit.

I can’t find myself to be a moral agent force for good if my physiological need to reproduce is making me beholden to the desires of women. What women desire for my life is my suffering, to undermine my existence to the point of nothingness because I am a South Asian American man that can’t even normalize within his own hyperminority. I can’t think of a single woman in my whole life that looked at my welfare selflessly, not even my mother, sister, or aunt (S.A.W.), the three women in my life that are supposed to care more about me than any other women should even if I were to take a wife. At this point, I think it’s impossible. Not because of these ridiculously contrarian views I’m spouting, because I’m simply that repugnant to the feminine ire that I can no longer see myself as attractive to those I care about attracting. Don’t get me wrong, I have a general disdain for all of humanity, how it treats it medium of exchange (money) over the valuation of personhood (hence why people have been bought and sold from the beginning of time until now), but because women are in primary control of the social forces at play, women are primarily responsible for money coming over personhood. No one will like me, but because a woman’s perspective is just a kaleidoscope of social normativity, it especially won’t be a woman.

I don’t want a woman who hangs on my words and come away from this hating their own gender, but there’s a reason many empathize with the notion of a woman who prefers the company of men over women. Not because she finds them attractive, no-no-no, they’ve all been friendzoned, it’s because they’re less morally manipulative specimens in a social arena. There’s not a constant play for social advantage or social dominance. Whereas men show their pride by flexing more literally, women step on each other much more willingly to get ahead and feminine engagement becomes a status-chase (even if the status itself empathy/emotional quotient). Every woman, from a very young age, is taught they must always do one thing well: exploit a man for everything he’s worth but never show your appreciation for what he’s worth, otherwise, it’s a sign of weakness and submission. Maybe that’s why lots of men find submission attractive, they see it as genuine appreciation...when in reality it’s often an even greater social ploy because no self-respecting woman would ever submit to a man by choice, even if they are completely, profoundly, and utterly wrong. Feminine submission always comes as a tradeoff for something else, masculine submission is expected as a necessity for consent which ironically somehow makes the person less masculine (way to internalize toxic masculinty, btw).

It’s gotten to the point where simping has become so normalized, every single girl that ever shows an iota of interest in me is always trying to get something out of me before she’s placed any of herself to be committed. Women just expect $1,000+ to be handed to them for showing a physical interest in a man at all, not committing to be with the man in any capacity, mind you. Even then, for most women, it’s just not enough. It’s like they want every man to be destitute while creating the least amount of real pleasure on men possible. When they say “suck you dry,” they mean your wallet and bank account, not your prostate. They want all of us to die in our Mid-50��s of prostate cancer because of course they don’t actually want to have sex at all so they would rather see us die a slow and painful death than follow their base instincts to put out once in awhile. If I haven’t made this painfully clear already, I don’t hate women. I want to hate women because I recognize every foul way they treat me, but I have a physical inability to hate women because of my own heteronormativity. My core claim is every woman is demisexual and only a statistical blip isn’t completely asexual to me, so why should I seek out happiness by companionship with one? Every moment I’ve spent pursuing the experience of a woman has detracted from something comparatively more morally productive, but I’m bound to it because life is suffering. Exploitation is the worst possible way to dehumanize one’s experiences and women seek to actively do that in their romantic relationships on a diachronic basis.

I know how fucked my views are right now, and I’ll delete them and this post when a woman proves me wrong and restores my faith in femininity. A depersonalized proof has no bearing on my personal views because I have to live my truth (funny how men are often denied the ability to live their truth out of monetary constraints yet women will always have another to lean on). I have no faith in the woman I love the most to be able to retain strength in femininity and she’s the only one I’ve experienced to appreciate me intrinsically. Even as an exception to a lot of the general patterns, she remains steadfastly unwilling to act for my, and thereby our, welfare with those intentions, making her a rather pitiful exception to say my views are wrong. If women want to be seen as positive morality, they have to stop working within the realms of being a slave to the patriarchy. Actively breaking down those barriers, even when a gender stands nothing to benefit, is good on its own. Patriarchal norms, in fact, pinpoint my specific ethnic diaspora and gender as the most abhorrent in the world and actively seeks to exterminate me when I’m not properly segregated to the group I was born into.

I’m going to get so much hate for this if any woman deems worthy of even so much as a reply, I doubt it though.

[nicholerestrada]

The revealing, complex gender politics of 2018’s ‘Halloween’

Jaime Lee Curtis has redefined the final girl horror trope with 2018’s ‘Halloween.’

Image: universal

This article contains spoilers for the original Halloween and its 2018 sequel.

The trope of the final girl — you know, the last one standing in horror movies, who either simply survives or also kills the villain that murdered all her friends — didn’t just define the slasher formula for decades. 

A staple of classics like Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Halloween, and A Nightmare on Elm Street, the final girl became the key to understanding the entire genre’s psychology. Or rather, how horror movies tackle our society’s biggest cultural shifts.

Now, with 2018’s Halloween and the return of the most prototypical final girl, Jamie Lee Curtis’ Laurie Strode has ushered in a new kind of slasher flick for the horrors uncovered by #MeToo.

SEE ALSO: Jamie Lee Curtis on ‘Halloween’: ‘They wanted to take off the mask of trauma’

Coined by feminist film scholar Carol J. Clover in 1992, the trope included a very specific set of characteristics from 70s-80s slashers: The classic final girl was virginal, virtuous, and innocent, especially when compared to her sexually promiscuous friends, who inevitably die. While conventionally feminine and attractive, her final confrontation with the villain also challenged on-screen gender norms, giving her a masculine autonomy that emasculated the male villain.

Above all, the final girl phenomenon forced audiences to identify with female victims (a true rarity in those days), by sharing in her triumph over trauma. 

Though the archetype evolved, critics, scholars, and filmmakers still see the final girl as a window into the Freudian fears that make great horror movies. 2012′s beloved Cabin in the Woods even used the final girl as the basis for its plot, pointing to how horror movies are a return to ancient rituals and sacrifice. 

Through the ritual of horror movies, we work through our most modern anxieties. John Carpenter’s original Halloween, for one,was somewhat unfairly maligned and oversimplified as a moral backlash to women’s liberation and the sexual revolution of the ’60s.

Meanwhile, 2018’s Halloween dives into the collective anxiety of stopping the seemingly unstoppable epidemic of male predators. 

The final girl of the #MeToo era is not defined by her victimhood, but by her determination to stop male predators from ever hurting people again.

In the original, the responsible Laurie survives the Michael Meyers’ rampage that kills all her party-obsessed friends. 1978’s Halloween made the final girl’s survival and rescue revolve around her victimization. But 40 years after those traumatic events, the final girl has grown into a badass woman. And 2018’s Laurie reverses what the “finality” of being the last remaining survivor means. 

Because now the final girl of the #MeToo era is not defined by her victimhood, but by her determination to stop male predators from ever hurting people again. In short, she seeks to make the villain the final male predator.

Even more important: Her survival is no longer defined by her being alone. It’s the exact opposite.

The timeliness of the new Halloween lies in how it speaks to a real-world moment of women coming together for a similar reckoning. As survivors everywhere seek to end decades of victimization, Laurie finally confronts her own predator, drawing strength from the solidarity and shared experience of trauma with other women in her life.

The brilliance of Halloween‘s update to the final girl trope goes well beyond the topicality of the #MeToo movement, though.

2018’s Halloween was written before the explosion of the #MeToo movement in 2017.And it leans into other modern trends in horror: Recent hits like The Babadook and Hereditary, for example,are slowly replacing the final girl archetype with the “dysfunctional mother,” or mothers who are demonized after suffering a monstrous trauma.

Happy Halloween, Michael

Image: universal

Certainly, gun-toting and reclusive Grandma Laurie fits that perfectly, as a woman who society deemed unfit to fulfill her traditional role as a mother after surviving Meyers. This ostracization is apparently what becomes of a final girl after she endures what Clover called a process of “masculinization.”

But ultimately, it’s not just the victims of slashers that reveal a film’s subtextual gender politics. 

Michael Meyers is coded as a very masculine evil, too — this symbol of what we might today call “toxic masculinity.”

The villain of Michael Meyers is coded as a very masculine evil, too — this symbol of what we might today call “toxic masculinity.” I mean, his origin story of murdering his own sister with a knife as a kid while she was having sex sounds like some serious Incel shit, right?

And, at the risk of sounding a bit Feminism 101, Michael Meyers can also be seen as an embodiment of patriarchy itself, especially in the most recent Halloween.

Think of what makes Meyers so terrifying. We very pointedly never see his face, the blank mask making him not an individual man (#NotAllMenAreMikeMeyers), but instead a symbol of the inhuman, all-powerful, deathless social conceit of masculine dominance. 

Meyers is never given any human motivation for why he does what he does. He does not want or desire, like a normal man. He is simply a force, punishing anything it cannot control. The horror of Mike Meyers is like that of an unfeeling social system: an unstoppable entity indiscriminately dehumanizing people.

Like the stoner boyfriend in the new movie points out, Michael Meyers is also a monster strangely grounded in reality, especially when compared to his more supernatural counterparts like the dream-hopping Freddy Krueger. We call him the Boogie Man because there is something so commonplace about his MO. He could be any male murderer from your favorite true-crime show.

Still unconvinced of Meyers as an embodiment of patriarchy, though? Look at his preferred weapon. You can’t get more phallic than a knife, a fatal form of symbolic penetration.

2018’s ‘Halloween’ is still a terrible movie for babysitters, though.

Image: universal

So if the final girl archetype in 1978’s Halloween was in some way a response to how patriarchy was handling women’s sexual liberation, 2018’s Halloween responds to the feminism of today.

It’s only fitting, then, that Meyers (as a symbol of patriarchy) is hell bent on silencing three generations of Strode women (Laurie, Karen, and Allyson), who band together to end his tyrannical predation. It’s even more fitting that every institution, from the police to Meyers’ doctor, prove completely inept at stopping him or helping the Strode women.

The horror of Mike Meyers is like that of an unfeeling social system: an unstoppable entity  indiscriminately dehumanizing people.

But some have already expressed their disappointment at the subtle, post-credits scene that indicates the three women in Halloween were unsuccessful in defeating Meyers. He could still be alive and well for a sequel.

And at first, it does feel like a slap in the face. After all Laurie’s been through — whether as the final girl or the dysfunctional mother — she still couldn’t conquer this symbol of patriarchal trauma.

But of course, that’s an apt metaphor for what it feels like right now to be waging war against social structures that uphold misogyny. 

As the hearing and appointment of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh showed, traumatized women continue to be put through a hell akin to slasher movies. Like Laurie, real-world final girls like Dr. Christine Blasey Ford are demonstrating unwavering strength and courage in facing the terrors they survived. And audiences can’t help but identify and empathize with them both for that.

As we’ve seen with #MeToo, it’s solidarity among all women that will bring down the patriarchy

Image: universal

Just when we think we’ve dealt the final death blow, though, patriarchal bullshit rises from the ashes again. It waves away women’s pleas to be heard, believed, and taken seriously as they demand an end to the widespread acceptance of male predators. 

No matter how hard survivors fight, maddeningly, the men and systems that abuse them still draw their ragged breaths. But 2018’s Halloween does leave us with one hope: We final women and girls have been preparing, learning, and remain ready for a battle to the death. 

We final women and girls have been preparing, learning, and remain ready for a battle to the death. 

Sure, generations of female survivors haven’t been able to end the real-world monstrosity of misogyny … yet. But we won’t stop trying. Because now, the hunted have become the hunters. 

Laurie’s chase through her house for Meyers in the final scenes of the new Halloween is an almost exact reversal of the first time she was a final girl. And like the new Laurie, final girls of today are no longer just fearful victims made into accidental warriors.

The battle is happening on our terms now. We’ve used the horrifying experiences of being women at the end of patriarchy’s knife as an opportunity to learn our enemy. We’ve prepared each other for the fight, like Laurie training Karen. And finally, we’ve turned the prison of our own trauma into the cage that will entrap our predators.

We do not necessarily continue this fight because we see an end in sight. We fight precisely because we cannot see the end. So all that’s left is for us to do is fight like hell anyway.

Because if final girls are known for one thing, it’s conquering horror even after all hope feels lost.

WATCH: Your nightmares are real: This interactive Halloween exhibit explores the dark subconscious

Read more: https://mashable.com/article/2018-halloween-reinvents-final-girl-feminist-horror-trope/

Source: https://hashtaghighways.com/2018/10/27/the-revealing-complex-gender-politics-of-2018s-halloween/

from Garko Media https://garkomedia1.wordpress.com/2018/10/27/the-revealing-complex-gender-politics-of-2018s-halloween/