The Weekly Buzz Kill: So what if she’s a skank?
Posted by Josh Gamble
Opinion, Sub Feature
Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010
Last week, The Arbiter ran a couple of pieces about TV Azteca reporter Ines Sainz, and the controversy about women in sports reporting that bubbled-up around her. A lot has been said about the appropriateness of women interviewing mostly-naked athletes, proper work-place attire for sports journalists and about whether or not she deserved the alleged harassment due to the way she was dressed.
The aggravating part of this whole ordeal isn’t the comments made by Clinton Portis. It isn’t the conduct of the New York Jets players, and it definitely isn’t the way Sainz was dressed. The problem is the “she was asking for it” rhetoric, based on her manner of dress and her sexually-charged photos.
Regardless of whether or not Sainz was actually harassed, no woman “deserves” harassment, and no woman is ever “asking for it.” This is the exact same rhetoric used by rape-apologists. (“Apologist” stems from the Greek word for defense, not the English apology.) It’s victim-blaming. It’s the notion that if a rape victim isn’t doing everything she possibly could to protect herself, she deserves what she got.
The idea often takes the seemingly innocuous form of rape prevention tips. “Don’t walk alone at night,” “Don’t drink around strangers” and “Take self-defense classes,” are a few of the more common ones. Since 77 percent of rape is acquaintance-rape or date-rape, maybe we should start handing young women pamphlets that say “Don’t have friends.”
Here’s a rape-prevention tip – don’t be a rapist. If we, as a society, drop the notion that to be manly, one must be predatory, maybe we’d see fewer rapists. A crime is the fault of the person who commits it, not the victim. Society is selling men short by claiming that they lack the self-control to act like a civilized human being around women.
This attitude isn’t limited to rape. The same argument is invoked to defend sexual harassment. “If she didn’t want to be a sex object for me, she wouldn’t be attractive.” The idea that if a woman doesn’t want to be harassed, she shouldn’t wear tight jeans, short skirts or low-cut shirts is absurd. Have you been to a department store recently? What else is there to buy?
“Sorry I’m not Amish enough for you, the black robe store is closed on Sundays.”
Women are told they must be sexy to do well in society, but if they are too sexy, they get no respect. It’s called slut-shaming. Society as a whole seems to think that if a woman makes herself too available, has too much sex or dresses too provocatively, then she is a whore and therefore lesser. Men, on the other hand, are encouraged to flaunt abs and chest muscles (if we have them) and have as much sex as possible. Men must be aggressive and virile, women must be passive and receptive.
The same is true of sexual expression. If a woman wants to have naked or semi-nude pictures or videos of herself distributed in magazines or online, that’s her business, not the business of the press.
In professional environments, particularly in male-dominated fields, a woman who is sexually available is a whore and gets no respect. However, if a woman is sexually unavailable, she’s just one of the guys, stripped of her gender identity.
Promiscuous women are not only dismissed and ridiculed, but are viewed as somehow being morally dubious. Fun fact: people have sexual appetites. Oddly enough, women are in fact people. Shocking, I know.
Aside from rape and infidelity, a person’s bedroom activities have no bearing on his or her character. Women deserve to have sex how they want, with whomever they want, as well as dress themselves as they see fit without coming under scrutiny from the rest of society.
http://arbiteronline.com/2010/09/22/the-weekly-buzz-kill-so-what-if-she%E2%80%99s-a-skank/
