I appreciate the sentiments expressed here. Some harsh language, but hey, it’s called for in instances:
However, allowing women who constantly commodify their bodies for the highest bidding award show or best paying record label to proclaim themselves as “feminists” without any outrage means we’re okay with them prostituting all of our bodies. Because this isn’t just damaging to them. They are creating a culture that sees all of us as parts and pieces to be acquired, sold, and traded at leisure.
This is precisely what has happened, past tense, in my opinion. Now we are left to undo the damage. Yet women cannot expect men to treat us respectfully when we don’t treat ourselves respectfully, as human beings, a trinity of mind, body and soul.
As an example of all of us being prostituted, let me give you this example.
A bunch of us girls go to help a friend move. I put on my moving clothes (FYI: not sexy) and show up in the summer heat. Our job is window cleaning–inside, and there’s no AC, since the windows are all open at this point for cleaning. It’s kind of hard work. Again, we are all in our moving clothes in an apartment in upheaval. I’m painting a picture so you can understand how not sexy this event was. We stop for a break. Popsicles! Hurray. Who doesn’t love popsicles, a childhood treat. We also need to a take a break because one of the windows jammed and could not be budged. We call the property manager for help, and he arrives to try and fix said window. He ends up joining us for popsicle treats.
Here’s where the pornification of culture happens. One of my friends is eating her popsicle, like every normal person does. He, the landlord, becomes somewhat fixated on watching her and though I find it weird, and notice it, I can’t figure out why. Finally he says, come on, can you just stop that! As if there is something criminal about eating a popsicle. And I realize what is happening. He is watching too much porn, and his mind has taken her eating a popsicle–an innocent, childlike activity–to a dirty place. If it can happen with my friend, it can happen with your daughter. We can debate causation here, but women and men: those who prostitute their own bodies for the making of porn, those who watch it, and a steady diet of advertising and movies that promotes women as sex objects are all to blame.
If some women claim objectification as empowerment, we are contributing to the problem, not solving it. This is not a post, btw, about victim blaming. Neither is it a post about “slut-shaming,” a term I see being used to ensure no one ever speaks responsibly about this sort of topic. It is a post about examining what constitutes empowerment, as women and men who must live together in this world.
by 
Leave a Reply