POP SECRET: PREGNANCE´

I know this is a little after the fact, but whatever. Beyoncé already had her baby. There was a huge kerfuffle about the fact that an entire floor of a hospital was monopolized for this event and the five-day-old has already been featured in a Jay-Z song that has topped the charts. But lets take a moment to roll back to the actual pregnancy.

For the entire time (and even in the weeks after) Beyoncé was pregnant there were rampant conspiracy theories that in actuality she was not pregnant and really just using a surrogate. Proof ranged from footage of a “collapsing stomach” to theories that the reason they rented out the entire floor was to hide the fact that it wasn’t actually Beyoncé giving birth to claims that because there were bottles of champagne brought to the delivery room that obviously there was no way she could be pregnant.



Now, lets direct our attention to other famous ladies. Other famous ladies such as Jennifer Anniston, Jessica Simpson, Angelina Jolie, etc. who have a never ending stream of pregnancy rumors swirling around them. Where a baggy sweater could mean 5 months in and eating a large meal means three. Where not drinking at a fundraising gala means pregnant. Where gossip rags will claim a stars “boobs look pregnant”.

While tabloids obsessing over famous womens bodies is nothing new, the dispute as to whether a pregnancy is “real” or not is a pretty unusual one. Wanting to cover up a surrogate seems like a bizarre move, seeing as Hollywood types have been public about using a surrogate and have caught little flack for it. But beyond reasons behind using a surrogate/not using a surrogate/covering up a surrogate is a terrible new development. On top of the on-going battle of too fat/too thin we know have another concern troll war ranging of covering up a pregnancy or faking a pregnancy. And walking hand in hand with the court of public opinion of whether or not you are faking a pregnancy is the battle over reproductive rights. Not only can this be seen as another step deeper into the complete okness of commenting on every womens body but also a step deeper into the okness of everyone having a say on what you do reproductive-wise.

What this all comes down to is ye olde violation of privacy. Again, this is nothing new to the stars, talking about the contents of the uteruses you don't know is par for the course, but with this we have a new key into the reproductive choices of women we don't know. While the public might feel lied to in reality Beyoncé has no responsibility to tell us the truth because it's her body. And really, we don't have any right to know what's going on with her body. When the general public acts like we have an unalienable right to know the contents of someone elses uterus we are adding another support to the structure that strips women not only of their privacy but of control over their own bodies. With this development we have a whole new way to not only scrutinize other womens bodies but also a whole new way to invade other womens privacy.

LONG OVERDUE: Occupy Oakland diary for 10/29/11 (anti-brutality march)

The Speak out against police brutality was followed by an anti-police brutality march. I had high hopes that the speak out would illustrate the fact that yes, the cops were brutal at the protests, but for a lot of people in Oakland police brutality is a daily reality. While I do live in a “bad neighborhood” I’m still a white kid and the cops are not going to harass me that much. If I go to a protest yes I will experience police brutality, but at the same time I can leave that protest whenever I want to. I could not go at all. While Scott Olsen has been martyred for being terribly injured due to police violence, and that night many spoke about the police violence that they endured while at the protests, the daily police violence that is experienced by the people of color in Oakland has been forgotten and left behind. While we march against privilege we are still leaving those voices stifled.

Afterwards there was a march. We ran up against riot cops at every turn. The same thing happened again and again. The “peace police” would line up in front of the line of cops, face the crowd and hold up peace signs, fighting with anyone who wanted to even get near the cops. Let me stop the story for a quick second to say FUCK THE PEACE POLICE. Is that even what they call themselves? I don’t know, it’s what we all seem to refer to them as. These are the people who have a habit of getting into screaming matches with protestors who err on the side of more aggressive confrontation. They have a tendency to engage in violence in the name of non-violence. I have never liked this faction of protesters. I’m fine with pacifists, or people who are non-violent and don’t push this belief onto others, but to me the peace police are using non-violence as a marketing tactic rather than an ideology. That their participation in non-violence is more about keeping a positive image in the eyes of the media rather than a deep belief. On this night, the fact that they faced the crowd with their demands for non-violence rather than the cops was incredibly condescending and smug. I was brought back to being a child and being told to use my inside voice, being told to have restaurant behavior. I understand non-violence and I agree with it a lot, but this was an anti-police brutality march, not a forum about peaceful protest. Don’t fucking face the protesters with your aggressive demands for non-violence, face the fucking main perpetrators of violence (the cops(duh)). For as long as I have been attending protest there is always one clear pattern, things don’t really get tense and violent until the cops show up. Every year in Olympia every fucking anti-choice person in Washington converges in Olympia to take over the capitol steps and condemn abortion. Every year we showed up to counter protest. Every year I had civil conversations with the other side. I would discuss easy and affordable access to birth control as a way to bring down the numbers of abortions with nuns for crissakes. It felt productive, it felt like the actual exchange of ideas rather than the hurling of insults. At some point in these counter protests the cops started showing up, and while things never escalated to violence, more insults were hurled across police lines, hatred built up inside of us and we got nowhere.

So every time we arrived at a row of cops the peace police would line up in front of them, facing the crowd and waving peace signs. The crowd would gather and chant “fuck the pigs”. Some people would fight with the peace police. Some people would try to make the march continue, to walk away from the cops. On several occasions that night I heard people yell “fuck the police! Just ignore them!” ignore them? Really? Like how in third grade when you got bullied and you are told to “ignore them”? Like when you get cat called on the street and you should just “ignore it”? Like they will stop? Like they will go away? Yes there is a lot of police brutality at this protests, yes it is wrong, it’s also really easy for a majority of white kids to spend a couple minutes chanting ”fuck the pigs” and then just decide to move on. I felt upset, I felt it was useless. A march against police brutality where we spent a lot of time “ignoring the cops” I didn’t get it. What’s the point? As we roamed the streets the chants changed from “who’s streets? our streets!” to “fuck the pigs” to “we are Scott Olsen”. We ended up heading down West Grand. Marches had taken this route before, traveling under the freeway and then back up San Pablo and back to the plaza. We shut down intersections temporarily here and there. As we headed down West Grand the chants went from “we are Scott Olsen to “we are Oscar Grant”. Instead of turning at San Pablo the march continued forward, at this point headed into West Oakland, a poor black neighborhood. I left. The whole thing felt futile and when it became clear that a group of white kids was about to march through a poor black neighborhood while chanting “we are Oscar Grant” I was disgusted. There has already been so little analysis of race in this movement that this was the most fucked thing I had witnessed. It was thoughtless. To make it worse I heard later that protesters were tagging the neighborhood. Really? What the fuck is wrong with you? So there’s going to be an anti-police brutality march that mainly concerns police brutality at protests and then we’re going to go into a neighborhood where police brutality is a daily reality and then invoke the name of a man who was shot in the back by a cop to condemn the violence used against you at a protest (yes these are both examples of police brutality but due to the habit of Occupy Oakland mainly referring to violence at protests when condemning police brutality and the lack of raising of awareness of the daily police violence that is experienced by so many Oakland residents I found this to be in poor taste)? And then trash the neighborhood? It was chaotic and uncoordinated. It was a disgusting demonstration of privilege within a movement that claims to be all about the abolition of privilege.

I made it back for the next nights general assembly which was for the most part a speak-out and vigil for Scott Olsen. For me this general assembly was another night of discouragement. The majority of speakers were Vets for Peace, and while they condemned the cops for their use of excessive violence and claiming “we’re just doing our job”, all I could think was, what the fuck did you do in Iraq? Because though you want peace now, though you have a better understanding of the war then we do, I’m pretty fucking sure you were “just doing your job” some point. I am putting my hopes on the general strike. I am hoping that it will feel like progress rather than a continuation of discouragement.

Just a thought.

Lately I've been obsessing about the effect of mass media on underground movements - not only the classic effects of distortion, watering down and appropriation, but the weirdly validating effects of mass media on underground movements. In light of the book Girls to the Front by Sara Marcus the mass media has turned its eye back to the riot grrl movement and it makes me wonder, did riot grrl feel like a cohesive movement before the mainstream media started paying attention? has any other movement felt cohesive as it was occurring?

PAY ATTENTION

To this.

ON STREET HARASSMENT

I was walking up the street this morning to get a coffee, possibly a donut or whatever else when a car pulled up to me containing some random dude attempting to get my attention. I have a general rule that if someone is trying to get my attention but aren’t explicitly saying my name they most likely don’t know me therefore I don’t react at all. Not even a glance. Not even a twitch. Occasionally I try to find hope in humanity and I will actually give a strange man the time of day, though it almost always ends badly. The worst being the time I was trying to be nice to my neighbor and it ended in him groping me in my kitchen. But yes, occasionally I’ll give being nice to my fellow man a try and this was one of those times. He asked my name and I refused to tell him, asked if I lived in the neighbor and I said no (not true), asked where I was going and I vaguely said around the corner, asked if I wanted to smoke a joint and I said no, asked if I needed a ride and I said no, asked if he could buy me a drink and I said no, asked if I had a job and I said yes, asked what I did and I again vaguely answered “I do administrative work”. He then told me he was a photographer and wanted to shoot me some time.

Ok, really? Really? You’re going to spend all that time hitting on me and then act like you just innocently want to take my picture? Like you just wanna do business with me? Does that approach even work for you? Ever? I actually get this style of proposition a good amount. Strange men (as in strangers, not just weirdos) approach me and say they want to take my picture or have me sing for their band or whatever else only after they spend ten minutes making passes. I’ve gotten some business cards and actually taken the time out of my fucking day to look at some of these dudes’ websites and more often than not its mostly naked pictures of girls. The guy asked for my number as he started to get out of his car at which point I loudly said “ok bye!” and speed walked away as the dude continued to try to talk at me. I spent the rest of the walk glancing over my shoulder and taking a mega circuitous path home. If it wasn’t already painfully obvious from reading this it sucks to find yourself in this type of situation and be forced to be on guard simply because you happen to be a lady walking down the street.

It doesn’t matter what I wear, what time of the day it is, what neighborhood I’m in, if I’m walking by myself its pretty much guaranteed I will get harassed at some point and I am far from the minority in this type of thing. I have yet to meet a woman who doesn’t experience some form harassment on a regular basis. It ranges from “you make my dick so hard” to “girl, you got big legs!” to dudes literally attempting to grab my crotch as I walk past them in broad daylight. I’ve had people follow me for blocks trying to get my attention until I finally turn around and growl out a fuck off at which point they either look surprised and confused or suddenly the relentless adoration turns into a quick “fuck you, ugly bitch”.

Even when its merely words being bandied about it still manages to be just as terrifying as actually getting grabbed. I know enough women (myself included) who have been followed home or been assaulted, read and heard enough stories about women getting dragged into cars or behind bushes that having “hey baby” hurled at me from a car as it speeds by isn’t just some asshole yelling at me but very well could be some asshole either stalking me or physically assaulting me. Sometimes it begins and ends with stupid shit being whispered in your ear and sometimes it doesn’t. One night I was walking home when a van full of dudes pulled up to me and asked “how much?” I screeched “fuck off” at the top of my lungs while they continued to amble along beside me when all the sudden it occurred to me that I was on a desolate street. Alone. With a van full of men following me. I ran the rest of the way home. That is fucking bullshit. Or the time I was walking to work and someone grabbed my crotch, which resulted in a panic attack that ultimately forced me to leave work early? Fucking bullshit. The time I was being followed by somebody in a car to the point that I had to run and hide in a bush for 20 minutes until the dude quit circling the block? Fucking bullshit.

But really, harassment is just another one of the myriad things that work together in order to exert constant control over women. It is another thing that dampens our autonomy and steals away control over our own bodies. When we do demand to be left alone in an angry and loud way we either get written off for being a bitch or being hysterical. We are told to get a thicker skin, that we should enjoy it, they are just trying to compliment us. It creates a bullshit situation that says, “Oh, you got harassed/assaulted/raped? You shouldn’t have left your house.” We are told that simply because of our existence we are “asking for it”. Being in public either begins to feel too dangerous to bother or at least too bothersome to bother. Women become out of sight, out of mind.

Do men truly believe that saying lewd things to women in an attempt to compliment us is actually a compliment? Fuck if I know. That shit does not make sense to me. Has any woman ever had some random dude whisper, “I want to eat your pussy” on the way home from the grocery store and dropped everything just to fuck him? Or what, go on a date with him? I have never fucking heard of this happening. Not even as an urban legend. Yet, it continues.

So what is it then? A reminder of domination? Is it less about sex and more about control? It would be really cool to feel totally at ease whilst walking around alone. I truly believe that one of the reasons for the continued harassment of and violence against women in the world is because of our collective avoidance of fighting back. This is something that is taught since birth. An avoidance of being violent, a complacency in the face of an endangering threat is deeply ingrained in women the world over. Do not take this as me blaming women for the assaults against us. This is much more of a “I see no end in sight what can we do?”, a bit of “it doesn’t seem like anyone else is fixing this, now what?” I truly think that if street harassment were met with violence instead of fear it would probably dissipate pretty fucking quick. If harassing a woman on the street no longer meant an exercise of power over someone but instead meant you would get your ass beat? Pretty sure men would think twice about it.

FIGHT BACK

Please read

POP SECRET: SMURFS, ETC.

So, there is a new Smurfs movie coming at us. Some 3-D bullshit. Everyday I ride the bart and I keep seeing this one Smurfs ad. I couldn't find an example of it but all of these things demonstrate my point just fine. Consistently in every ad I can find all the smurfs have expressions ranging from happy to sad to angry to confused except for smurfette, who consistently has what I like to call is a "come hither" look.



I mean, really? Granted, in the original cartoon she's kind of ditzy and flirty, so maybe they're just being consistent? Either way it kind of reminds me of this:



It's a fucking piece of candy. A fucking cartoon. It seems the way to illustrate that this candy is a lady candy or that smurfette is a lady smurf is to make them sexy. To give them bedroom eyes and come hither poses. This is how to signify female with things that in a way lack gender. A piece of candy? A weird blue creature? These things aren't human so in a way they could get away with being genderless, by anthropomorphizing a piece of fucking candy a need for gender assignment is created, and while m&m's and smurfs who are assigned male gender seem to have a range of personalities, female m&m's and smurfs only get sexy. This causes a conflation of these two seperete ideas, sexy and female, to the point that they become interchangeable. Also interesting to note that in both of these cases we only get one female gender assignment in a world full of male gender assignments.