via Steve Silver …
Uhm … wow … I just read all 4 pages of that demented document. I feel … I have no words … I … I … There’s SO MUCH to comment on … but … I guess total insanity makes my mind go blank or something. It was the shaving section that really made me go blank. I … I … But also his … obsessive scoring and grading system … like if you really look closely at the system, you begin to see the swirling crazy going on here. wow …
wow ….
Well, if you are against a reasonable document/contract like that, I can see there’s no reason for us to ever go out for “COCKtails.”
I don’t know who is more bizarre–the person who came up with the contract, or the person who agreed to sign it.
She didn’t sign it.
//A copy of the proposed contract, which Frey’s wife never signed and later provided to cops, can be found below.//
I wonder if he was even able to keep track of that scoring system?! My God, I gave up after two seconds of looking at it. It gave me a migraine.
And the shaving! What about how she had to present himself to her so that he could inspect and measure everything?!?
I’m at a loss.
curly – hahahahaha I know!! – I actually tried to figure out the scores, and then felt the derangement settling in and had to give up.
Psycho.
Um, I just reread my comment and noticed a major gaffe. I meant to say, she had to present herself to him. That complicated scoring system done fucked with my brain.
hahahahaha
I understood your original comment, though, curly – so that means his lunacy has touched BOTH of our brains.
For purposes of clarification, “asshole” and any form of it that appear in this document shall refer to Travis Frey.
You will, as of the moment you handed me this perverse and demanding piece of crap document, fuck off to the farthest corner of the globe from where I reside. If you should chose to fuck off and die to spare other women your absurd misogyny, that would be great and you will be given granted Good Behavior Days, where you will be free to rot in the Hitler Wing of Satan’s Palace.
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Asshole will never again come near me, speak my name, recall me in his thoughts, or masturbate to memories of my likeness. This request is to be performed immediately and without question.
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Conditions (typeface features letters of the alphabet being humped by naked ladies)
If you violate these conditions under any circumstances, I reserve the right to respond with any of the following:
a) popping a cap in your ass and dragging your bloody corpse to the police.
b) inviting my new pet rottweiler, Cannibal, to eat you for lunch.
c) severing your manhood and skewing it on a spike for display in my front yard.
d) shove your marital duties contract up your ass, followed by the entire contents of the tool shed.
e) fabricate evidence and frame you for a felony so you spend the rest of your life being fudgepacked by a large man called “Bubba” who likes to call you his “Little Bitch.”
oh. my. god.
hahahahahahahahaha
For some reason, I had to laugh at his use of the decorative dropcaps to head up each section.
I mean, what I’m reading is completely insane. The dropcaps are just the icing on the cake.
I like the understatement in this line: “Frey, prosecutors contend, apparently is a rather demanding guy.”
Tommy -bwahahahahahahahaha
Yes!!! The font just adds to the crazy!! hahahaha
steve – hahahahahaha I know – the first sentence of the whole Smoking Gun report made me laugh out loud:
“This country, as you know, is filled with the deranged.”
Emily, that may be the funniest thing I’ve read that you’ve written.
I just have to repeat: “The Hitler Wing of Satan’s Palace.”
Upon re-reading it, the math is what galls me. The dimensions that he’s gone to the trouble to specify for her to shave herself. I mean, he’s had to sit down and think this stuff through. Throw out some measurements, rethink dimensions.
Tommy – right? Creepy!
It’s like his sex drive is soooo fragile that if her pubic hair is a half a millimeter longer than it says it should be in “the contract”, he’s done for the night.
He’s actually really really considerate. He lets her take a break from the thongs on days when she is menstruating. So nice.
He’s a total catch. So much so that I just might have to give up the whole lesbian thing. I mean, allowing for granny panties during menses and measuring pubic hair? That’s hot.
Looking back over my life’s relationships, I think the worst fight started with my telling her to stop shaving her legs with my shaving razor.
It ballooned from there, but that’s what started it.
I ought to look her up, send her that link and say “See? I wasn’t as bad as I could be….”
Did you see at the end he says, “This is not a contract; it is a description of rules for you.” So he didn’t really care if she signed it or not. He’s not asking for her consent. He’s just telling her how [he imagines] things are gonna be.
I’m curious what the timeline of events was with this marriage, contract, and attempted kidnapping. Did he write it before the marriage, immediately after, or later? Did she leave him as soon as she saw it? How long between her reaction to it and his attempted kidnapping of her? Or does the presentation of such a document itself constitute a transformation of a marriage into a kidnapping episode, to the legal satisfaction of prosecutors?
Upon re-reading it, the math is what galls me. The dimensions that he’s gone to the trouble to specify for her to shave herself. I mean, he’s had to sit down and think this stuff through. Throw out some measurements, rethink dimensions.
Tommy, I bet he was an engineer. Anyone that stays in an engineering program for more than 2 semesters turns psycho.
(I left after 1 semester. Thankfully.)
if she were a sub and he were a dom and this was an actual contract signed with mutual consent, it would be one thing.
but as it is…i hope they lock him up for a long, long time, and i hope she gets some help dealing with what she’s obviously been through.
Holy Fucking Crap
I’m with Red on this one. I really don’t know what to say about this. Nothing except “what a fucking jerk-off” comes to mind. Never mind that there is a person that would actually write something like that, but that…
hahahahaha, that’s great curly!
Thanks, Mr. Bingley! Personally, I’m still giggling over Emily’s contract. The whole thing is hilarious but for some reason, the real kicker, for me, is this:
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I think I’m going to make that my email signature or something.
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curly,
It would be one of my greatest honors. Truly. I bow before you.
Consider it done.
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What is the most potent word for “humble” in the name of gay rights that exists? Gumble?
Well, I’m not the best person to ask since I am, after all, like the Worst Lesbian Ever (TM). I’m sorely lacking when it comes to the history — and the vocabulary — of the gays. HOWEVER! I can bring it up at the next membership meeting and perhaps the head homos can bring it to a vote. Hell, even if they vote it down, I’ll work “gumble” into my day-to-day vocabulary until it catches on. Convention be damned!
I’m gumbled that you’d ask me such a question.
See? I’m using it already!
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P.S. I tied one on tonight, in case you couldn’t already tell. Drunk commenting is even more fun that drunk blogging. And not nearly as regretable as drunk dialing. Although, Sheila, I reserve the right to ask you to do some deleting tomorrow. :)
Curly,
E-mail me. Any time.
Sheila…I reserve the same right.
I stopped reading at “object insertion”.
Shudder.
Steve, as a lawyer, possibly my own favorite part of this demented piece of psycho control freakery is indeed where, at the end, he makes sure to mention “this is not a contract.” Well, holy shit, really? No, come on, you think?! Seeing as a contract is a voluntary agreement between parties that’s legally binding, apparently even this schmuck realizes no court would ever actually enforce it. Involuntary servitude has, after all, been illegal in this country since the 13th Amendment.
“…does the presentation of such a document itself constitute a transformation of a marriage into a kidnapping episode, to the legal satisfaction of prosecutors?”
Looking at the Iowa kidnapping statute (§ 710.1, Iowa Code), I’m not sure. It might depend on how broadly the case law has construed “confine.” Of course, even if not, one might still be able to argue that presenting the documents counted as an overt act sufficient to charge him with ATTEMPTED kidnapping.
(God, I just SO want to be a prosecutor and send slime like this away.)
what a freak! EEEEEW…EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!
I must now go and scour my frontal lobe with bronze wool. Thanks a bunch.
So, does this mean that the contract I signed for Tom wasn’t such a good idea??
My BIL used to lay out my SIL’s clothes before they went out. Apparently, what she wore to work or at home was her choice, but when they went “out” HE was to choose what she wore because “it was a reflection on him.”
He also told her that the six-week postpartum wait for sex was unacceptable, and if the doctor “insisted,” well, she’d just have to give him oral sex, because there was “no way” he’d go that long without sex.
They are divorced.
Jeeeeeezy chreeeeeezy.
I hope this doesn’t fuel the defense’s possible plea for insanity, because frankly, after reading it, there’s not a doubt in my mind that he truly lives in a world all his own. There are many interesting pieces of antique devices (thumb screws anyone?) I’d love to apply to his testicles, daily from 20 minutes after the kids are put to bed and for three hours from then, or 811 when travelling. I might also consider the application of thigh-highs (not knee-highs, tights, or stockings) with pressure to his neck area (which must be perfectly shaved that day) as well as object insertion (the sex toy of choice) into his left nostril.
//jeezy chreezy//
hahaha “Dad, I told you not to call me Jeezy Chreezy!”
Lisa – You’ve told me a couple of stories about your ex-BIL before – just horrible – he sounds like a -well, a dousche-bag. Glad she got out of that mess.
My friend Allison emailed me this morning, and her subject line was; “It’s too early for vaginal slits and GDBs” hahahaha It was the first thing she read when she woke up – sorry, girl!!!!
Oh, he’s not my ex-BIL. He’s D’s little brother, and believe me, “douche-bag” doesn’t even begin to cover it.
Oh – got it. Took me a second to get the connection! Good lord – amazing – it’s like some people truly think that they need to be little petty tyrants in their own little fucked-up kingdoms in their houses. So strange.
What truly amazes me about the whole thing is that this guy was even able to land a woman in the first place. It also makes me wonder about the wife a bit. Does she not possess a working insanedar?
I don’t know much about her. I wonder if she was inexperienced sexually – so he was able to smooth-talk her, romance her – and then when they got married spring his derangement on her.
If that’s the case, then this entire story is practically a propaganda poster for premarital sex.
Well, I know that with my BIL, who has found four (4!) women to marry him, it’s a process. Like a frog in a slowly-heating pot of water, they don’t know they’re boiling to death.
He is VERY charming and VERY smoove in the early days, so affectionate and available (even when married to someone else!) that they fall into his spell. He’s a former police officer, so he has the whole “protector” vibe going on. He’s very good-looking, tall and dark, too. It’s easy to see why so many women (and they are LEGION) find him attractive.
Plus, his “type” is very specific. He likes ’em meek and weak-willed; malleable, if you will. The type of woman who easily accedes to him. On the off chance he reads a girl wrong, and finds out later she DOES have a spine, he dumps her quickly.
I swear, he’s a textbook example of a sociopath. We have little to do with him, but when we are forced to interact, I study him like he’s a 6’3″ anthropology experiment. It’s fascinating.
Lisa – true that, the dangerous ones are ALWAYS a little bit charming.
Was anyone else totally creeped out by the clinical precision of the language? It sounded like he was ordering up tech specs for a machine. And he’s got serious issues if pubic hair skeeves him.
Lisa – fascinating. Creepy.
I wonder how someone ends up being like that. Are you born that way? Or is it a mixture of nature, nurture?
I myself – a pretty savvy girl, with a really hotheaded temper, who is not above slapping a guy who gets in my face inappropriately have found myself out on a date with someone where I suddenly realize: Oh God. He hates women. I can feel it. He won’t let me finish a sentence, he is condescending the crap out of me, he has already made up his mind who I am because to him all women are alike … and He’s a snake. Move slowly, but firmly, and WALK OUT THE DOOR.
Hostility like that does have a scent, you know. For the most part, I can pick up on it within 2 seconds of a conversation – but sometimes the act that they’ve got going on is pretty good – and it fools me. Not for long, though.
And yeah, his measurements are totally skeevy – he obviously has put a lot of thought into it, and also probably broken out the tape measure once or twice. God forbid women have hair WHERE IT IS SUPPOSED TO GROW.
it kind of pisses me off that people would “wonder about the wife” in this situation. clearly, this was an abusive relationship, and it’s not like he walked up to her in a bar with this contract as his pickup line.
also, since we know about this because he’s been brought up on kidnapping charges, in my mind the most likely scenario is that she *did* try to get away from this cocknocker, and that was the result.
in our justice system, it’s pretty difficult to get a husband indicted on charges of kidnapping his own wife–there’s obviously something even more heinous that has occurred here–this horrible document is only a piece of EVIDENCE toward that larger issue.
this is what this maniac was willing to put in writing–imagine what he was willing to do to this woman off the record. cf. also the portion of the document that tells her that if she refuses to be “compliant” with something he demands sexually, he will “tie her to the bed” and rape her repeatedly “until she is compliant.”
you don’t think this might have been a spirit-breaking experience, a textbook instance of Stockholm Syndrome? from what i’ve seen of this case, she’s probably lucky to be alive.
why does HER role in this ever come into question?
But Beth – you’re “wondering about the wife” too by saying //you don’t think this might have been a spirit-breaking experience, a textbook instance of Stockholm Syndrome// – how is that not “wondering about the wife”?
There were two people in this relationship. What was going on with her? Nobody has said she asked for it or that she was stupid or deserved it. At least I haven’t read any comment like that. I would have deleted any such bullshit comment on my blog, anyway.
I wonder about the wife, too. I wonder who she was, and what her story is. There ARE personality types that get involved in these situations. There are certain paths that can lead to abusive relationships – in the same way that certain paths can lead to people joining cults, or becoming drug addicts.
So even MENTIONING that a woman has a sense of responsibility over her own life means that … somehow she deserved what she gets?
No. It means that it’s interesting and important, actually: why she would put up with that. Fine, you can come up with as many psychological reasons as you want, you can name it, and label it – but we’re all doing the same thing. We’re “wondering about the wife”.
And just so you know where I’m coming from on this, beth – you wrote a post last week about this horrible rape case in Italy. I completely agreed with your entire post about it – except for where you said //, I’m of the belief that even if a woman is walking naked down the street, if a man comes up and has sex with her without her consent, it’s still rape//
Well … yeah, but I sure as hell am going to “wonder” about her sanity and her judgment.
Take care of YOURSELVES, women. Don’t expect the world to take care of you.
I do not judge this poor enslaved wife at all – and I am glad she had the presence of mind to get out, and to turn him in. Good for her. He is now being revealed – to all the world – as a FREAK FROM HELL. An awesome punishment.
And I sure as hell would like to hear her side, and to hear how she got herself into this mess.
Now I’m on a roll:
Another chilling example of a guy who seemed to have a GREAT outside game-face was Jeffrey McDonald – the Green Beret who was a doctor, a golden boy, who married his childhood sweetheart – and then ended up killing her, and their 2 children. He’s still in jail.
Colette McDonald was sweet, innocent, malleable, and forgiving. Soft-spoken, submissive. Obviosuly very sweet. She loved him. He was her high school boyfriende. He was charming and handsome. She met him when she was 17 or whatever. Slowly, as the stresses of their lives heated up – his narcissistic tendencies started popping out – he couldn’t stay faithful – he had huge rage and self-righteousness – and whatever – one night he killed his entire family.
Was Colette stupid or duped? No, obviously not. He was the guy she loved since she was a kid. The murder probably came about because of a mixture of TWO reasons – and BOTH should be important:
1. He was narcissistic, and so much of a pampered golden boy that when things started going wrong for him, and he stopped being a “winner”, he SNAPPED
2. She was the type of malleable woman who put up with a lot of shit from her man, and never fought back or whatever.
Now a lot of people find #2 to be completely unmentionable because it means you are somehow “blaming the victim”. i find this to be not only nonsense, but insulting – because it assumes that women have NO agency in their own lives, they cannot make choices, they cannot have responsiblity … Nope. It’s all just because of the big bad men.
I happen to believe that the CHOICE of men – and the type of women who choose such men – is also important.
This does not mean that there are not blatant assholes in the world – and Travis Frey seems like a psychopath, frankly – but I refuse to believe that her role in this whole thing is somehow irrelevant.
Glad she got out. Good for her.
From a much-previous comment: Anyone that stays in an engineering program for more than 2 semesters turns psycho.
Weird? Maybe. Psycho? Er, no. That kind of damage has to come from something orders of magnitude more extreme than college.
What, me, touchy? Well, it’s been kind of a spiky day…
//Now a lot of people find #2 to be completely unmentionable because it means you are somehow “blaming the victim”. i find this to be not only nonsense, but insulting – because it assumes that women have NO agency in their own lives, they cannot make choices, they cannot have responsiblity … Nope. It’s all just because of the big bad men.//
a totally valid viewpoint, and not uncommon. but i didn’t take other comments (not just here) about “why did she go along with that” as wondering about the wife as in “i wonder what her experience was”, but looking for some way to assign her responsibility for her husband being a total psychopath.
and as far as being the sweet type who takes shit from people…it’s true there are people out there like that, men AND women, but i don’t think there’s something *wrong* with that personality. given the right situation it’s a wonderful way to be–for example my fiancee. he can be passive; he “goes along to get along”, and is nonconfrontational. there are people out there who will take advantage of that–in some instances, his ex-gf is an example. but i see that as someone taking advantage of a personality type, not a personality flaw, and i still think the blame or responsibility or what have you lies with the person doing the advantage-taking, not the person with the perhaps passive / timid personality. it’s like hearing about a little old lady who got mugged…and being like, “well, she shouldn’t have been so old and fragile! then her arm wouldn’t have been broken!”
not everyone is outspoken. not everyone has chutzpah. that doesn’t mean, in my opinion, that they bear responsibility for someone else’s heinous wrongdoing–especially on the level of this guy we’re talking about. he says right there in writing he’ll rape her till he breaks her spirit if she tries to resist him–that’s not the kind of thing, as has been pointed out, that happens overnight, and it can happen to the most otherwise strong-willed people, too.
i wouldn’t characterize this as the belief that women as a general group have no responsibility / choices, and if we’re talking about a guy who calls you fat or cheats on you and having a “kick him to the curb, girlfriend” reaction i’m all for it. but when you’re dealing with the level of depravity here, i think it’s a different ballgame–and i think his level of insanity is such that it makes her “responsibilities”–not in getting out of the situation, which she obviously did, but in somehow instigating or causing the situation, which is what i read in that type of “wondering about the wife” comment–negligible.
basically i think it does more harm than good, when we’re talking about rape or violence against women in general, to criticize a victim for how she “put herself in that situation”–as many victims succumb to that line of thought themselves and never report or retaliate against their abusers for that very reason–they blame themselves.
anyway…longest comment EVER…not trying to beat a dead horse here, but just wanted to clarify where i was coming from. i, er, hope i succeeded at all in all those words. anyway…
beth – I believe I have left some LONG ASS comments on your site myself!! No worries – it’s all very interesting. Believe me, I hear what you’re saying – but I don’t think that pointing out that someone might have put themselves in an unsafe situation is, necessarily, criticizing them or blaming them. It’s just pointing out what it is obvious. I happen to think that rape IS different from other crimes – but it is, after all, just a crime – and if you park in Harlem, and leave your car unlocked, then – well – you’re an idiot if you’re SHOCKED that your radio got stolen. I know that rape is different – and it assaults someone on a different level – but I try to navigate my life as though I am, well, like that car. If I go to Harlem, I don’t leave my doors unlocked. I don’t put myself in those situations – or I try not to. Now there are also cases (which I mentioned in one of my other comments) where you are kind of blindsided by someone’s cruelty or misogyny or whatever. But we can only do what we can do and try to control our own actions.
I think women need to be taught how to handle themselves better in situations – I think it’s the downside of feminism, frankly – women strolling into college thinking they own the world and that they should be able to behave however sluttily they want – and then be shocked when some guy takes advantage. I remember going to some date-rape seminar in college – and one girl was saying, “I think you should be able to say No even when you have your hand down a guy’s pants and you’re trashed …” All of this ferocious nodding in agreement went on – but I remember my friend David said something like, “But I think women need to be taught that that kind of behavior isn’t responsible.” You need to be clear, firm, and you need to know where you stand on certain things. And of COURSE you can change your mind, blah blah blah – I’ve done it myself, and guys I’ve been with have done it to me – no biggie … that’s being a grown-up – I don’t think there’s a “point of no return” – Like – if you’re naked, then it’s not rape! Please. That’s bull shit! Or like that horrible story you posted last week. If you’re not a virgin, it’s not rape. Please. That’s just hatred of women.
But I don’t think that pointing out that there are levels of responsibility – means CRITICIZING.
And I so love what you said about the acquiescing personality not always being a bad thing. That is so right on, beth, and thank you so much for bringing that up. It’s a distinction I was missing here.
I think, sometimes, with 2 people – it’s a certain CHEMISTRY that brings out the worst in each of them … You know? Like maybe a submissive type female would flourish with a kind gentle masculine man – who didn’t SHAME her for being submissive – but maybe if the submissive was with a semi-sadistic man her submissive would bring out the sadist in him even more. Does that make sense??
So your boyfriend who has the lovely quality of wanting to ‘get along’ – is lucky to have someone like you who recognizes and loves that about him – as opposed to HATING that part of him, seeing it as “weak” or whatever.
It always amazes me to see people get together who obviously have CONTEMPT for one another’s best qualities, but obviously it happens all the time.
Dave Chapelle has a GREAT bit about women dressing sexy and then getting offended when men hit on them.
He said what if he got a policeman’s uniform and went around wearing it. Then someone got mugged and they ran up to him going, “Go chase that dude! He robbed me! Help me!” Then he would say, “What? You thought I was a policeman?! That’s crazy! I’m just wearing CLOTHES! CLOTHES don’t make me a policeman!”
He said, “If you don’t want us to think you’re a hooker, ladies, don’t wear the uniform.”
I don’t know if that fit this discussion or not, but it’s funny, right? :)
“I’m just wearing CLOTHES” hahahahahaha
I think a lot of it is in the attitude of the woman. I really do. I’ve had people catcall me before. I usually take it as a compliment. Jesus, I’m gonna wear red lipstick and stilettoes and be offended??? Usually guys are just trying to tell you they like what they see. It’s rowdy, sure, it objectifies you – but whatever. If it’s done in fun and with appreciation, I’m all for it.
But then if a guy is an asshole – like that guy in line for a cab who harassed me – and if his response when I say, “Please back off” is to MOVE IN ON ME… sorry, dude. You’re gonna get slapped. In public. In front of all your friends.
Served him right.
You know, the best piece of advice my mom gave me was that some people are just jerks, and you the quicker you identify them and deal with them, the better off they’ll be. Don’t try to change them to non-jerks; it won’t work.
I have big boobs. If I got a case of the ass every time some dude looked at my boobs, I’d have no time to deal with, oh, I don’t know, BREATHING. It’s not worth it. The assholes who can’t look me in the face aren’t worth it. I just deal and move ON.
But my friend Bonnie, who also had big boobs, would wear low-cut tops and then get all huffy when guys would stare. It never made sense to me. I think she LIKED being offended, is what I think.
“Don’t try to change them to non-jerks”.
Excellent advice!!
I think, too, when you’re younger it can be harder to negotiate this stuff. It takes some getting used to. My first relationship was with a guy who, I think deep in his heart, as much as he loved me (he was a great guy) – wanted a willowy sun-dress-wearing Laura Ashley model who was into bungee-jumping and heli-skiing in her spare time. I can see that NOW – that I just wasn’t really his TYPE – and he would punish me for the qualities that didn’t fit into his type, etc. etc. I was young.
I was, to put it mildly, NOT a willowy person – I was kind of a clutz. He HATED my clutziness and would get all annoyed when I dropped stuff, or tripped, or whatever. I just am clumsy. Why be MAD about that?? Later boyfriends found all of that stuff charming, goofy – whatever. Laura Ashley sundresses?? I wore hi-top sneakers, little kilts, combat boots. And heli-skiing? Bungee jumping?? Uhm, no. I’ll read my book back on the lodge, you can meet me back here.
I look back and am AMAZED that the relationship lasted as long as it did. But that was just youth, you know? NOW I would never be in a relationship with a guy who kind of just wished I wasn’t … ME. Why bother? Plenty of guys really like me just the way I am … so I’ll hang with THEM.
Hard to learn that stuff, though. At least it was for me.
Good turn to the conversation. In particular I’m thinking about traits v. flaws.
There’s a concept from Chesterton’s “Orthodoxy” that has stuck with me very strongly – the idea that the Fall of Man did worse than loose vices on the world. The virtues had also been set loose, no longer counterbalanced, and they have done greater harm.
That’s what I think about when I think of traits v. flaws. ANY trait can become a flaw when pressed into service that’s ill-suited. A man may break his neck in some ridiculous ‘extreme’ stunt, and that’s bad – but he may also risk himself to save others from a burning building. The courage is not too different in each case but the first situation called for prudence, not courage.
And that calls up what Beth said: “Not everyone is outspoken; not everyone has chutzpah.” True that. But even quiet and stoical types can resist, and chutzpah can be misapplied. (I daresay that Fred Phelps and His Scowling Jackasses have quite a lot of chutzpah.) I love that you love the gentleness and peacefulness of that man o’ yourn, Beth. Love him the more for it, in fact. I would only worry if he backs down when standing up is more proper.
(PLEASE don’t misunderstand, I’m only using him as an example because he’s already come up in the discussion. I’m not saying that he does or does not any particular thing, this is hypothetical.)
here i go at the dead horse again…lol.
it is the belief of the feminists i have spoken with not that “women should be able to act as sluttily as they want and have no repurcussions for it” but more toward “the idea of ‘sluttishness’ is an oppressive, double-standard concept unfair to begin with, unfairly applied, and the world would be a better place if women were able to be free with their sexuality without the word ‘slut’ coming into the equation at all.” it is, of course, an idealistic and in many ways unrealistic way to think, but so is *any* political theory at the far end of the spectrum, regardless of which end.
and yeah, it would be dumb to leave your car unlocked in harlem. but even smart people do dumb things all the time…and i guess to me it doesn’t matter if you made a mistake–it’s still someone else committing robbery to steal your radio. someone leaving a door unlocked does not equal “you have permission to steal my things”, but i think we agree on that. and the whole “responsibility” thing cuts both ways in that example too, since to fault someone for leaving their door unlocked in harlem accepts the notion that people in harlem can’t *help* but steal and commit crimes, which kind of goes hand in hand with the often subconscious notion, when talking about rape and sexual assault, that men can’t *help* but rape women–and that it’s up to women to prevent them.
but as we are seeing, it is just such a terribly difficult subject, and the source of plenty of debate on this here interweb. i’m glad this conversation has been 100% more civil than most of the ones i’ve witnessed. :-)
as far as the chappelle comparison, i have to say i think that’s apples and oranges. if we’re talking about a woman being approached by a man looking for sex who thinks she’s likely to want to have sex based on the way she’s dressed…well, that’s a whole different ballgame from whether or not someone enslaved to a psychopath “put herself there” or not. and there’s also a difference between “hit on” as in “offering to buy a drink / using a pickup line” and “hit on” as in “grobed, grabbed, coerced, intimidated, harrassed.”
i also don’t think dave chappelle would support his analogy if it were being used, say, to support the stereotyping of blacks dressed in FuBu or Sean Jean clothes as gangbangers, drug dealers, and intent on mugging people.
and finally (i think…lol), sheila, you’re right that people often have contempt for other ppl’s best qualities…but i also believe that ppl’s best qualities are often also their worst qualities depending on the situation. believe me, i’m no angel…sometimes steve’s gentleness and ability to “go along” turns into “stick in the mud” behavior, just as sometimes my big mouth means i’m assertive and articulate and other times it gets me punched in the nose. :-) the key, to me, is to celebrate the one side of the coin and forgive the other.
And what Red said goes double – one of the reasons we need friends, spouses, etc, is for that balance. The two together are more balanced and grow further than either could alone.
Oh Beth, I HEAR you on the whole “slut” thing. I really really do. To some ignoramuses, women who – duh – admit they like sex are “sluts”. Please. I do not listen to these people because I do not respect their opinions. hahaha
I guess, though, I have seen a lot of that Girls Gone Wild brand of feminism (oh boy … did I just say that??) – kind of like: “I can dance on top of the bar, and pour shots of tequila down over my navel, and have my best friend lick it off – and then get all huffy when some guy acts like I’m up for grabs.” That kind of bullshit does exist and it makes all of us look bad.
But I’ll tell you I had my own journey with just – being okay accepting that I’m a sexual being, and it’s okay – and … uhm … it’s MINE. It’s not anybody else’s. It’s MINE. Now please remember: I’m kind of old. hahahaha But this is something I still struggle with. People who don’t know you will try to tell you what you are. Based on their own judgments, biases, bad experiences. You have to know what’s okay for YOU. Know what I mean? That, to me, is true feminism. And it shouldn’t LOOK a certain way.
You know how on A little pregnant there’s such VICIOUSNESS towards mothers who work – or mothers who stay home – and it’s so volatile – and everyone thinks they know which way is RIGHT. I’ve seen a lot of that shit with feminism – and again, I’m older than you – so maybe it’s better now – but I remember when Camille Paglia first really hit the scene – I was just out of college, and true-blue feminists literally acted as though she was sent straight from beelezebub’s lair. To me, she was MY kind of feminist. I don’t think feminism is a dirty word – not at all – but I don’t like totalitarian feminists, if you know what I mean. This may be more and more of an outdated thing – I’m not sure, not really in that world anymore. I hope it is. I hope there is room for all of us.
It strikes me, from nightfly’s wonderful comment (love the whole traits vs. flaws thing) is that men go thru this as well. What is a real man. Now people get very HUFFY about this question, and I find it tiresome – because I know all kinds of men – and – er – they’re all men. No bones about it. I, for one, am glad that there are more diverse models for manhood now than there were, say, 50 years ago – because I just don’t think people should be made to feel bad about what they ARE. (Unless that person is Ted Bundy. HE should feel bad.) My own personal preference is for the old-fashioned type masculine guy – but that’s just my preference.
Uhm … I have strayed far afield of the topic, it seems. But it all made sense at the time.
And I guess, Beth, back to the car analogy: I think unlocked car in Harlem DOES equal “please rob me”. There’s just a level of irresponsibility there that needs to be acknowledged. Not like: “oooh, you are an evil person, and awful” but – come on. You were foolish to leave your car unlocked.
This is a very gnarly issue for me – because I remember when the conversation about the Central Park jogger took a turn and became vehemently hostile towards “yuppies” and “women who run” and all that stuff. Wow. It was one of the ugliest conversations I can remember.
NOBODY fucking deserves to have their eyeball smashed into the back of their skull just because they were a little careless. NOBODY. I just don’t think that kind of talk helps the debate at all. It’s hostile, it’s a stalemate, and it completely lacks compassion.
Actually, nightfly – your analogy about the dangerous stunt and the burning building reminds me of a quote from Jon Krakauer’s amazing book Into Thin Air about climbing Everest. Have you read it?? So good. Anyway, he climbed that year a blizzard came up and a ton of people died. So he was lying in his tent, basically dying of hypoxia, no more oxygen tanks, people dying all around him – and in retrospect he wrote: “If I die, no one on earth will think this a tragedy. I have no business being up here.”
Now that doesn’t mean I think people should be BANNED from climbing Everest! I love wacko people who do wacko things. But just know the risks, and don’t think you are immortal, or “above” certain things – like death on top of the highest mountain in the world.
i definitely know what you mean about the “girls gone wild” thing. i totally agree with you that there’s not only one kind of feminism and you are dead-on that i don’t have nearly the length or depth of experiences with it that you do. i’ve actually only just started exploring it again after being nearly driven to homicide by women’s studies majors in college, whom i have come to realize were just pretty much calling themselves feminists to fit in socially and had constant one-upsmanship contests about who was more “radical.” i saw women who called themselves feminists behave in inhumanly bitchy ways toward guys for no reason, and definitely wanted to yell at them. i hear you on the frustration, definitely. and i completely respect your views on sexuality, and that it should be private–in most ways, i share that perspective, too. that’s all well and good when we’re talking about our own personal choices, but when we’re speaking theoretically as we have been here, i still think i feel differently from you.
to me–my kind of feminism, if you will…it’s kind of like when fat girls (and i’m a fat girl just to establish where i’m coming from) talk about fat acceptance but think nothing of saying stuff about “skinny bitches.” it’s like, you can be proud of your body, even if most people think it’s unattractive, but how dare you, in that case, shit on someone else’s body type and call it “pride”? so in my world, you can be a feminist and believe women shouldn’t be part of the “sex class” (listen to all this jargon i’m throwing around–lol)and all that, but i personally don’t think it’s any more right to apply different rules to women who dress or behave in a way you and i wouldn’t.
i freely admit i’m an existentialist, a post-modernist, and a complete, godless moral relativist. but i really don’t think a girl who says “I can dance on top of the bar, and pour shots of tequila down over my navel, and have my best friend lick it off” shouldn’t necessarily reserve the right to “get all huffy when some guy acts like I’m up for grabs.” but–importantly–it depends, for me, on what “acting like i’m up for grabs” means.
again, i draw a distinction between a guy “acting like she’s up for grabs” in terms of speaking to her or asking if he can buy her a drink or whatever. there’s NEVER anything wrong with someone just approaching another person. and yeah, if she behaves stupidly or is mean and lays the rejection on thick in that instance, she’s in the wrong. but to me, it still isn’t right, no matter what she’s been doing, for a guy to grab her physically or call her a derogatory name, assume she’s “just a slut” and act like an ape–to, essentially, ASSUME from the get-go that a) it’s all been a show for him and then b) he can act towards her however he wants now, without trying to communicate verbally, like a human being and an adult. it’s one thing to approach her; it’s another thing to harass her.
kind of a tangent, but i find it interesting that the one instance in which a woman can be publicly naked and behaving “sluttishly” and it’s almost universally accepted that a guy is in the wrong if he even touches her is if she’s a stripper. in that case, guys understand that it’s a show, an act, something she’s doing for her own benefit as well as theirs, and if they get in her face a big fat bouncer is going to throw them out on their ass. that instance, to me, proves that men can accept that a woman being naked and even gyrating her crotch in their faces doesn’t give them the right to even touch her–even if they’re giving her money–and that men, in the case of the bouncers, can police each other and stop each other from harrassing women. so why would the assumptions be different if it’s a regular, non “working” girl? i don’t know, but they sometimes seem to be.
i see it as a respect issue. there is a definite difference to me between thinking a woman is hot and acting sexy and trying to get with her, and setting out basically to harass and humiliate her because she’s just some ho and obviously cheap and easy. it’s the assumptions that get me–the reaction on the part of some men that a woman like that “obviously doesn’t respect herself, so why should *I* respect her?” i think in this day and age a woman acting in the way you described isn’t necessarily doing it out of a lack of self-respect, and even if she is, i think a guy watching should respect her because it’s the right, and human, and adult thing to do, in all cases, not because she can–or has to–give him a reason.
Oh shit I just wrote this whole huge comment and lost it. I am so fucking bummed.
I can’t recreate it. It was too long.
sniff, sniff …
I’ll try to boil it down:
If some guy makes an assumption about me because I walk around dressed like Marlene Dietrich in Blue Angel (which – I used to – I was pretty wild in my mid-20s) then I don’t really BLAME him for making that assumption – If the assumption is: “wow, she’s up for grabs” – then he is completely wrong, and I will set him straight – but if I dress like that, then assume that I know what I’m doing. I’m aware of the importance of signals …
I’m kinda old-fashioned. I like there to be a bit of mystery between the sexes – not all this politicizing of the borders, if you know what I mean … I like courtship, seduction, flirtation, etc. I like a guy who is a bit old-fashioned in that respect, too. Who doesn’t hit on me with HOSTILITY (god, I hate those guys) – but who hits on me with appreciation.
I have a friend who gets pissed off whenever guys approach her. It’s like she gets all high and mighty about it: “who do they think they are??” I’ve seen her annihilate perfectly nice guys who made the huge mistake of coming over to chat her up. She’s gorgeous, too. It’s like she doesn’t want to own it or something. I told her to never go to Ireland, because the guys there are all pretty old-fashioned (except for being BATSHIT INSANE) and are all about making a girl laugh, keeping her glass full, being attentive … I mean, eventually, you’ve gotta say “yes” or “no” to these people – but in the meantime, there’s this whole flirtation dance that goes on – an artform that is sadly being lost in some circles in this country.
Sex is dangerous and primal. There’s a reason we try to have some social control over it. It’s our animal side. Old-fashioned folks admit this – and acknowledge it. Middle-class college feminists (at least the ones I knew) didn’t want to admit that, and wanted to have it both ways.
Well, I prefer sex (and by ‘sex’ I’m not talking about intercourse – just talking about approaching each other, and hitting on each other, and all that) to be primal. I prefer it to be kind of a wild world – where I need to control the signals I’m giving out, like a little mating firefly or whatever.
I don’t blame guys at all for looking at drunk girls dancing on bars and making assumptions. The guys themselves are drunk – so inhibitions go by the wayside – and the girls are giving off the strongest signals possible. Does that mean they “deserve” to be raped in an alley? HELL NO. Go ahead – dance on a bar!! I’ve danced on a bar. I admit it. But be responsible, and don’t be shocked when someone makes an assumption about you. Go right ahead and set them straight if they don’t “get it” – but don’t be shocked that they made an assumption.
Sex and courtship and the whole flirtation dance is ALL based on assumptions – and I think academic feminists want to do away with that – they want to regulate people’s behavior.
I am not into that.
But like I said – I’m old-fashioned.
ok. i think our conclusion can be:
assumption = ok
harrassment = bad
i do think this is awful:
// have a friend who gets pissed off whenever guys approach her. It’s like she gets all high and mighty about it: “who do they think they are??” I’ve seen her annihilate perfectly nice guys who made the huge mistake of coming over to chat her up.//
Beth – I think just to bring this whole thing full circle, we need to formally agree. So if you don’t mind, taking Travis Frey’s lead, I have drawn up a contract:
LET US AGREE THAT:
assumption = ok
harrassment = bad
____ initials
LMAO.
and what if i’m noncompliant?
You will forfeit any and all GBDs until the year 2008.
okay, I’m arriving late at the party, and I’m going to be the loon who pipes up with something utterly trivial after everyone’s begun talking about Kant and Wittgenstein and all that, but:
“typeface features letters of the alphabet being humped by naked ladies”
You know, that just creeped the hell out of me? Like, he thought he was going to prettify the document or something, but inserting that? I mean, it’s not even a standard Windows typeface, he probably had to go out and buy it….
I don’t know. All I can say is that if karma exists, this guy is going to wind up as some big hairy prison-dude’s bitch, and he’s gonna have all kinds of crazy-ass “rules” he has to live by.
I just felt my skin start crawling as I read the document. I commented recently to my mother that “there are lots worse things than being in your late 30s and not married” (referring to myself) but I honestly had no freaking idea how “worse” things could be.
the whole shaving thing especially. (This is TMI: but if I were involved with a man who expected me to shave “down there” – all of it, not just the necessary bits for looking ok in a swimsuit, I’d probably give him the choice: you can have me as I am, or I’ll shave for you but you don’t get to have sex. Your choice. I know some guys have very strong preferences in that way, but I also have a very strong preference for not having to deal with razor burn…)