Two posts about family dynamics and responsibility — and against the myth of male weakness — at Good Men Project:
You’re Not Your Daughter’s Handsome Prince (Against Emotional Incest)
and
Princes, Princesses, and Mothers-in-Law at GMP
2
Monthly Archives: November 2011
New Video from “Healthy is the New Skinny”
Healthy is the New Skinny and the Perfectly Unperfected Project have released two new videos. In the first, Katie Halchishick and I talk about the whole issue of authenticity and beauty — a discussion of real v. fake similar to the one I touched on in this Jezebel piece. The second looks at the issue of bullying in schools, and explains how the PUP program can be part of the solution.
Check out Real Beauty and Bullying in Schools.
Talking Men and Feminism on KPFK: UPDATED
I’ll be appearing tonight on KPFK radio’s Feminist Magazine at 7:30PM PST. Along with Pia Guerrero (of Adios Barbie) and Melanie Klein (of Feminist Fatale) we’ll be talking about Men and Feminism — and our December 1 panel on that topic at Santa Monica College.
Listen live here, and a podcast will be available within a day or two.
UPDATE: Here’s the link to the show.
LDRs and Turkey Drops
My pre-Thanksgiving Genderal Interest column at Jezebel: Technology Can’t Stop the Turkey Drop. It begins:
There may be tears around the dinner table tomorrow; as any campus psychologist can tell you, Thanksgiving is “turkey drop” time. The term famously refers to the holiday break-up, when college students who’ve been in long-distance relationships return home and end things with their sweethearts. The stereotypical “turkey dropper” is a college freshman whose boyfriend or girlfriend is still in high school, attending another college, or not in school at all. Come late November, he or she has spent two or three months marinating in a new environment, has met new people, perhaps had a hook-up (or fallen for someone new). Summer’s starry-eyed promise to “make it work, no matter what” has become late autumn’s “I think it’s time we took a break.”
No Grey Area: The Lolita Myth and the Lingering Lie of Male Weakness
Today’s column at Good Men Project asks a simple question and gives an even simpler answer: Can Young Girls Really Seduce Older Men? Excerpt:
Rightly concerned as we are about the sexualization of young children, we need to be careful to remember that teens and tweens are sexual. Children and adolescents need the space and the freedom with which to develop their own healthy sexualities, free from the unhelpful encouragement to “be sexy” for others and from the equally toxic pressure to repress all of their desires until marriage. And one key way we help young girls develop a healthy sexuality that is theirs alone is by creating a culture in which they don’t see themselves as objects of adult male desire. That means the onus is solely on adult men to set and maintain good boundaries.
Some teens do want, or think they want, sexual attention from older men. But the reality that underage girls (be they 11 or 17) occasionally behave seductively towards older men doesn’t mean that older men can “be seduced.” The word “seduce” means “to be led away” or “to be led astray.” No adult is so weak that he (or she) is powerless to refuse sexual temptation, much less from a child. As powerful as the libido is, it is not so strong as to trump the will. Testosterone may drive desire, but unless a man has sustained significant trauma to the moral center of his brain, hormones can’t override the power to choose. (Hint: an erection doesn’t constitute significant trauma to the right temporo-parietal junction.)
Penn State and Sexual Shame
I finally said something about the Penn State tragedy. Here’s To Prevent Future Penn States, We Need to Celebrate the Good in Male Sexuality
Excerpt:
My take-away from the Penn State tragedy is one of wonder and optimism. I marvel that the university’s trustees were willing to fire an octogenarian living legend for the grave lapse of not having done more to protect children and to do so by phone. I expected far more voices to be raised in defense of those whose commitment to the reputation of an institution trumped their moral obligation to kids. That Paterno’s firing has proved so popular nationwide (the stupid antics of a handful of PSU students notwithstanding) is indicative that we’re more willing than ever to confront the atrocity that is child sexual abuse. There have always been Jerry Sanduskys, and there have always been Joe Paternos to cover for them. Though we might wish that each faced a stiffer penalty still, what’s been done so far is more than would have been done just a few decades ago.
But progress is not perfection. And when it comes to rape and molestation, we can’t settle for the comforting reassurance that these crimes are becoming slowly rarer. Far too many women are still raped, and far too many boys and girls abused for us to be self-congratulatory. We need to continue to push for more protection for children, and we need to do more to teach men to end their own complicity in the culture of silence and tacit approval that makes rape still so common.
Tom concludes his piece with a reminder: “The real problem is that until now we haven’t wanted to look at sexual misconduct in our own communities.” And it’s about time we did.
That’s absolutely true. But we also need to remember that while pedophilia and related disorders are genuine mental illnesses, they are aided and abetted by sexual shame. In a world where the hefty majority of rapists and abusers are men, that means that helping men–all men–overcome that shame is a critical part of the “solution.” What Tom calls “misconduct” flourishes where frank talk about sex and desire is off-limits. Ignorance, silence, and the distrust of pleasure facilitate that misconduct.
Please read the whole thing.
Pushing Back Against the Real/Fake Trope
Today’s Genderal Interest column at Jezebel: Real Women Have… Bodies. It begins:
Last week, the UK lingerie chain Ann Summers launched a new campaign using what the company claims are “real women” from across England as its models. Theirs is the latest example of authenticity advertising, a trend that dates back to 2004, when Dove launched its iconic “Real Beauty” campaign. In the 21st century, “realness” is now a marketing mainstay. But it’s also become a divisive concept, as those who fall short of what’s “real” are inevitably derided as “fake.”
It’s been nearly a decade since the release of 2002′s Real Women Have Curves, the film that made America Ferrera a star and served as likely inspiration for what Dove would soon develop. As charming as the movie was, the darker implication of the phrase was hard to miss: if real women have curves, then perhaps women who don’t are “less real.” A new double-bind for women was born: those who met the skinny ideal could now be labeled “unreal,” and those who were still shamed for being heavy were now encouraged to take some sort of comfort in being more “legitimate” than their slender sisters. As a result, the real/fake dichotomy became as common — and in some ways, as toxic — as the old virgin/whore dynamic.
Resisting the Old Boys
Though it’s not exactly a take on the Penn State scandal, my contribution for the Good Men Project’s business ethics package is up: Resist the Old Boys. Excerpt:
In our culture, we socialize men to crave the approval of other males, particularly those in positions of authority. The pressure to “give in” and join the OBN (Old Boys Network) isn’t just from older men; for many of us, it comes from within ourselves, as it speaks to our intense, socialized desire to have our masculinity validated by powerful father figures. Sometimes, the OBN coerces us to join a club we already long to join.
Perhaps that’s why it isn’t easy to refuse OBN invitations. One key way to make it easier is to seek out mentors of both sexes. Another is to form close working relationships with women as well as men, resisting the temptation to “flee” to all-male spaces. Men and women can be friends outside of work as well as colleagues in the office. As long as we maintain the fiction that that’s too difficult or too at odds with the laws of nature, the OBN will continue to have a much easier time finding new recruits among the ranks of already privileged young men while excluding women of every age. And a new generation in the Old Boys Networks will learn to cover up for the most indefensible and horrific actions of its members.
Talking Sexual Harassment in Schools on CNN
Full video of my interview on CNN HLN:
CNN appearance talking sexual harassment in schools
I was interviewed on HLN today by Richelle Carey, talking about the new AAUW study on sexual harassment in schools. Click here: Hugo Schwyzer interviewed about sexual harassment in schools