Hey Joss, I love you man, but you’re wrong…

So I’ve been re-watching Buffy: The Vampire Slayer for about the 2^nd Billionth time recently, and it doesn’t seem to get old. In fact, now it has bonus 90’s nostalgia, so that gets better.

And Joss Whedon writes cool, likeable characters (debates over Tara notwithstanding), which is why the show has so much rewatchability. In fact, I’d say Joss’ best skill is his ability to make you care about his characters. His second important skill is to then kill those characters right when everything is going well for them, but that’s another story.

But recently Joss came out with a speech about his dislike for the word Feminist. It’s an entertaining speech, so rather than put words in Joss’ mouth, I recommend you watch this for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDmzlKHuuoI

Now as much as I love the man’s work, I have to disagree on a few different levels.

I want to have a look, first of all, at the notion of a “natural” state. The “natural” state is a highly problematic notion that seems to carry with some pre Garden of Eden utopic ideal, from which we are removed. And the battle ground over what is or is not considered natural is one of the more fiercely contested fields of ideology; it is the field in which homophobes, racists and sexists have all attempted to plant their collective banners.

This idea, that there is a blank, neutral, pure self upon which negative structures are overlayed, is inherently fraught and problematic. I’d argue that the mind, whatever it is, is the emergence of structure, and that emerging as feminist is no different, operationally, than emerging as a sexist, or racist, or whatever degree of those various positions you inhabit. The mind has no pre-formation state – if you understand that there are men, women, and states in between, then you have some notion of what those things mean. The nature of the signifiers you attach to those words can be anything, but if you have those words, you understand there to be some difference between those things. 

The next issue goes to that issue of degree. Joss makes the argument that the term “racist” allows you to put the context of it in the past. To that extent, I agree. The problem is, that in putting something in the past, in renders you unable to address it in the present.

I can’t address the roman practice of crucifixion, because it’s in the past. No one is literally crucified for crimes against the state anymore. And, to an extent, I don’t need to; because it’s long gone, and buried, and the Roman Empire is a distant shade of memory.

But race is not the same. Issues of race continue to afflict and damage people. Structural racism, subtle and not so subtle forms of influence that create barriers to some people, and open doors to others, pervade our society.

And here is where the issue with the binary nature of the word “Racism” exists. If I term something racist, I immediately categorise it in the same box as the Holocaust, the KKK, transatlantic slavery, and every other historical horror story. And people will react accordingly. And whilst many people may not consider structural issues that bedevil our society as being a problem they have to concern themselves with, they also don’t see themselves as being comparable to these monsters of history. Thus, calling such things “racism” seems hyperbolic, an overreaction. It is the very extremity of the word “Racist” that leads people to preface statements with the qualifier “I’m not racist, but…” before launching into a predictably racist diatribe.

Confining racism to those things that are “behind us” is a tool for preventing discussion of the world we live in now. It is a tool for silence, for the perpetuation and extension of privilege, for the maintenance of an unacceptable status quo.

So this is where I’ll start to look at what purpose the word “Feminist” serves, and why, unlike Joss, I think we need it and should defend it.

Here’s a part, where I will admit culpability to some terrible traits; traits I should not possess and that are a blight on my character. I am, to some extent, a racist, and a sexist. I judge people unfairly on attributes they have no control over and are in no way reflective of their true character. I have unkind, nasty thoughts that have no basis in fact and are instead the result of absorbed prejudices and ideas. I am a beneficiary of many kinds of racial and sexual privilege and would not have the faintest idea of where to begin divesting myself of that.

I say these things, not as form of self-flagellating castigation but instead in recognition that I, like probably everyone else, am not a complete human project. I catch myself thinking terrible things, and acknowledge those thoughts as what they are, and try to do better. I try not to give these thoughts any currency as being legitimate or meaningful, and instead think my way to the bottom of them where their untruthy tendrils begin.

In respect to one of these questions, I have a word for that ongoing project. I am a feminist, and whatever sexism lurks within me is contested by notion that I have not done enough.

Feminist is an active word. It sees a world that needs to be changed. It challenges the status quo. It tries to improve. When Katy Perry says “I am not a feminist” this is what she means. She does not want to be seen to be challenging the world as it is. My active feminism is pretty small, and meek. I challenge myself. If someone says something grossly misogynistic in my earshot, I will endeavour to correct them. But it’s there, whatever it is, an active movement within me.

There’s no equivalent word when it comes to issues of race. There’s no descriptor for trying to lessen the inequality brought about by centuries of colonial rule, or for actively trying to recognise the prejudices that you contain within your multitudes. And I am less well armed without this word.

So I don’t think we need “Genderism”. We don’t need the idea that equality is something that can be achieved passively, that we can comfort ourselves that we aren't “genderist” and move on with our lives, ignoring the many examples of imbalances in power that surround us. We instead need more feminists, and we need to ask others to consider why they aren't feminists too.

So sorry, Joss, but you’re wrong.

(Also, fuck you for killing Wash.)

Here we go again...

So this, apparently, was a thing:

http://www.mamamia.com.au/social/sexual-assault-and-alcohol/

Every few months this issue seems to rear its head again. Some well-meaning individual decides that young women must be woefully uniformed about sexual violence in our society. The same individual believes that alcohol is the primary vehicle for making young women vulnerable and they would do best to avoid it or minimise its use.

As anyone who reads this who knows me probably should know, I have been embarrassingly, ridiculously drunk in my time. I have blacked out with a faint impression of standing on a table in a Sydney karaoke bar singing “Total Eclipse of the Heart” as if my life depended on, only to wake up in a King’s Cross backpackers with no wallet but a monster hangover indicating the likely location of my now missing funds. I drank enough at an art gallery opening that I became completely suggestible and at the urging of my mischievous co-drinkers interfered with artworks before getting lost in the city and getting cabs home with strangers, and got motherly advice from a Taxi Driver to “drink a glass of water”. I’ve developed infernal concoctions of Malibu and Tequila that lead me to giving prized possessions away to strangers. I’ve used my martini making skills to run a bar only to wake up the following morning with a black eye bad enough that I spent Christmas eve in a hospital. I’ve met random travellers, sang to piano players, gotten lost, kissed strangers, swam in fountains, and raised a general level of agreeable mayhem.

Should I have done these things?

My liver probably says no. A number of these incidents could have been worse, and I guess I’ve been lucky, to an extent.

But these adventures have formed the backdrop of my youth (and not so youth). My drunken foolishness made me friends in Japan, has given me great stories and has led me up many wonderful garden paths. My life without these stories would not even be recognisable to me. It might be better, I might be wealthier, but can I imagine my life without them? Not even remotely.

I’m sure that many would recognise their own misdeeds and stories in the list above. And although you might want to edit some of these out, would anyone really want to excise from their life of every night of excess as a method of forestalling the possibility that someone else might choose to do something horrible to you?

Because that’s what we seem to be saying to young women. And we don’t seem to recognise what we’re asking them to give up.

We’re certainly not asking men to give up drinking. Given as they are the segment of the population overwhelmingly responsible for these crimes, that seems a lot fairer.

But instead, we demand that for the sake of their safety, young women forgo what is, for good or ill, a major part of Australian identity; our drinking culture.

This is done, because rape is an inevitable and unavoidable part of society, or so the story goes. Because warning women about rapists is the same as warning people about sharks; they are just part of the backdrop of our lives.

Firstly, does anyone really believe women don’t know this? Women, in my experience, are aware of the limits to their safety in a way I have never had to consider. Women know the risks, and they make calculated choices on the basis of that risk. If I had to choose between a life of stories and avoiding that risk, I doubt I’d choose the safer choice. Of course, I’ve never had to, and that's the point.

And of course, the other thing a woman has to consider is that they face the risk of sexual assault if they go to work, if they go to school, or in a disturbing number of cases, stay at home. So given as the risks exist, why not enjoy what they can?

Lots of people have made the point, better than I, about how telling women to be the source of control normalises rape culture. What I wanted to raise, was what we ask women to do when we state that their only chance of being safe comes from renouncing all excess. It’s not just swimming between the flags; it’s giving up on the ocean. A choice they shouldn’t have to make.

PS. I've been out of the writing thing for a while, my brain is full of study nonsense. I hope to shake the rust off with this one. It's rushed, so please, if you have criticisms, expansions, counter arguments please post - my rhetorical skills have dwindled arguing only with teenagers!