Nature, Nurture, Culture, Yaaa!

cross-posted at UneFemmePlusCourageuse .

This has nothing to do with elections, nevertheless…

Oh, Speech class. How you constantly infuriate me.

This, by the way, will have nothing to do with the Idiot Boys . It does, however, have to do with the guy I have previously referred to as ‘Seemingly Singular Nice Boy,’ (SSNB) who since that day I have realized ain’t nice. (Was it the fact that he used something I said as his own argument and then, when he misstated it, threw it back as mine, leaving me to defend a mere shell of my actual position? Maybe. It’s also the horrible vibes that seem to suggest both, "I think I am better than all of you and you do not recognize my brilliance because you are idiots" and "I am a creep.")

Anyway, a girl in my class gave a speech about rape and sexual assault and sexual harassment/street harassment, and how that all ties into the patriarchy. Awesome. It was a really excellent speech, period, even when I am trying to be unbiased and pretend that she didn’t completely represent my belief system in a very good way. She mentioned Andrea Dworkin very briefly, my teacher mentioned (aka misstated) what Dworkin said about sex and rape without talking about Dworkin’s motivations and reasonings behind her statement, and basically made Dworkin out to be a total nut whose work is without merit because of it. (Anyone discussing Dworkin and John Stoltenberg’s relationship needs to know the history behind "political lesbianism" as well as the theory of a continuum of sexuality, or they will not get it.)

At some point in her speech, however, this girl had said that rape is part of patriarchal culture, as well as that we live in a patriarchal culture. Now, notice that she did not say that patriarchal culture=modern American culture and only modern American culture. I would of course agree that modern American culture is patriarchal, but it is far from the only place and time to exhibit such a culture. That rape shows up in other cultures and in other times does not mean that it is part of human nature, it means that those cultures, like ours, were patriarchal.

However, SSNB was saying that rape isn’t part of our culture, it’s part of our nature.

You know what I hear when a man says that? "Beware and fear my mighty penis, it has the power to rape you and I have no control over it, and if you ladies you don’t obey everything I say, well, than I might retaliate uncontrollably." (I hear a different thing when women say this, and it doesn’t scare me but it does make me sad and it does make me want to educate them–what I hear is, "I have been taught either through words or experiences that men cannot control themselves, and that I must therefore be hypervigilant, and obediant to a male protector.") I do not trust men like that, period. They do not want to believe that rape is part of culture, because culture, unlike nature, can be changed, and they do not want to change, they do not want to challenge the belief that they are natural predators and women are natural prey. They want to have that fresh supply of prey ready and waiting to be blamed for their own actions. They cannot find common ground with women, particularly women like me who see men as natural allies, people who have been subject to the other side of the patriarchal culture*.

And I see this line of thinking as an important part of paternalistic "we must protect the women from the evil penis" line of thought as well–they see male nature as something bad that they want to protect their daughters from–but don’t do the most helpful thing of challenging their own beliefs and realizing that it is completely in each individual man’s hands whether they rape or not, and that the culture, which values men over women, believes that it is the right of men to rape, and to basically do with women’s bodies as they see fit.** You do not protect anyone by capitulating to a culture which hurts them. You protect them by challenging it. I’ve heard Barack Obama’s commercial about equal pay in which he says, "I want my daughters to have the same opportunities as your sons" (I guess this is about the election) and that is a caring father. He’s saying, "I want my daughters to be able to do what they want in the world." Beautiful to hear.

And then you’ve got guys like SSNB–ready to go out and hurt women and blame their natures for it. It’s a scary world we live in, ain’t it?

Down with the patriarchy.

* Look at this , if you want to see what I mean. I have this poster in my room and I love it.
**I addressed other aspects of this before here .