Letters from No-One: Happy Birthday J.K. Rowling

Transgender Trend has created a letter to send to the BBC, the Guardian, and the New York Times in honor of J.K. Rowling's birthday. Please follow the link to see and copy the letter to join the cause. 

https://www.transgendertrend.com/happy-birthday-jkrowling/

I emailed them and added this statement at the end of my letter.

My name is Sly. I am a 55-year-old American woman who lives with neurological, physical, and psychological challenges. I have been fighting for equal treatment for all people and for an end to the appalling misogyny that women are subjected to literally since childhood. I was dismayed when I started undergoing puberty, not because I didn't want to be a woman but because I saw the way women are treated. I have been horrified by the misogynistic vitriol that J.K. Rowling has been subjected to, including sexual harassment and death threats, simply for recognizing that women are subject to sex-based discrimination.

 The conflation of sex and gender over the past decade has resulted in terrible harms to the rights that women have been fighting for during the past century and more. Women are being violently silenced for speaking out about sex-based discrimination and are being accused of "transphobia" for realizing that the experiences of transgender women are different than the experiences of those who are born women.

J.K. Rowling does not hate transgender people and neither do I, but both of us are subject to hateful and violent threats for recognizing the erosion of women's rights by a radicalized group of trans rights activists whom the media has capitulated to. J.K. Rowling has been much braver than anyone should have to be, and I honor her for it. It is time that the major media outlets have the courage to stand up for open and rational debate regarding these issues as well.

Sincerely, Sly

Sly Likes: Feminist Poetry from H. Hennenburg

Image by Dimitris Vetsikas from Pixabay

The statue depicts Dame Millicent Fawcett (11 June 1847 – 5 August 1929), an iconic British feminist.

Today I encountered a thought-provoking poem entitled The Shape of Water. It was written by H. Hennenburg in 1998.

"But do you know that a woman's voice will change the world slowly? Light will creep in where she unburdens her heart."

This poem inspired a train of thought for me.

It makes me think of a line from the song by Ten Years After.

"I'd love to change the world but  I don't know what to do. So I leave it up to you."

Then there's another song that comes to mind, this one by Ani DiFranco.

"I am not a pretty girl, that is not what I do."

Here I am, a woman who sees the ways in which we could be kinder to one another and make the world a better place. But since I am a strange old bird and not pretty at all, I have a hard time making myself heard. The world doesn't tend to listen to women who look like me.

Then again, they don't tend to listen to the women that men fall all over themselves to get next to either.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Royalty-free image copyright Julia Henze. Purchased from 123rf.com

Notes

Sly Fawkes is your ornery old Aunt Cie's snarky political alter-ego.

The Icky, Sticky, Nit-Picky Legalese, if You Please (Or Don't Please)

Content copyright 2020 by Cara Hartley

Please do not repost

Reblogging is acceptable on platforms that allow it.

Sharing a link to the post is acceptable.

Quoting portions of the post for educational or review purposes is acceptable if proper credit is given.

Friday Flashback: Sly Speaks: Me Too: The Workplace Edition

Copyright Tara O'Brien

This post was originally published on 13 December 2018. It was penned by my political alter-ego, Sly Fawkes.

I was thinking back to a "wonderful" incident which happened while I was working as an assistant district manager at the Denver Post in 1986. One of the carriers became friendly with me, initially in a perfectly acceptable and professional way, and I enjoyed our little chats. But then one day he said to me: "I'd like it if I could give you a hug sometime and maybe a kiss."

A lot of you ladies, particularly of my generation or older, will be able to relate when I say that I was trained from a young age to "be a lady" when a situation like this arises and to "not hurt his feelings," so rather than asking him in what the hell universe hitting on his supervisor was appropriate, my first response was to say "I'm married," so I wouldn't hurt his feelings. As if doing this sort of creepy thing would have been appropriate if his target wasn't married.

My initial reaction is to think what a doormat I was for reacting this way. Plus I never even told my supervisor, because I didn't want to get the guy in trouble. But my next reaction is to be angry that I believed his feelings were more important than mine, which was disgust and betrayal.

So, yeah, not going to be angry at my younger self for being taken aback and not behaving in a more assertive fashion in this lurid situation. The guy displayed not only gross sexism in having zero respect for my position of albeit mild authority just because I was a young woman, but he displayed zero respect for me as a human being in seeing me as an object that he could potentially grope and slobber on.

For some reason, when I was younger I seemed to draw a lot of creepers like this to me, probably because I tried to be nice. I'm honestly not at all sorry that my current age tends to render me invisible to this breed of asshole most of the time.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Graphic copyright Juliahenze @123rf.com

What the Left Refuses to Acknowledge

A response to this article:

Why liberals don't understand what Trump represents

"he was never the bearer of a virus, which implies something alien"

The Left refuses to acknowledge that a lot of men, including "progressive" men, want to BE this sonofabitch. They want to be the corrupt, gloating, xenophobic, pussy-grabbing, philandering bully. They want to be adulated and to have the money not to care when people call them out for their deplorable actions. They want to be the Big Man.

The Left is not as pure as it likes to proclaim. Hugh Hefner was not a conservative. Many so-called "progressives" would be perfectly happy to relegate those they see as lower than themselves to permanent serfdom. There are no few "progressive" men who, though they may proclaim that they don't want women confined to the kitchen barefoot and pregnant, want their trophy wives and support full legalization of prostitution although studies of the countries that have fully legalized prostitution show that doing so benefits punters rather than prostitutes. 

The liberal "feminist" women who loudly proclaim that "sex work is work" refuse to examine the obvious problems with human trafficking and refuse to see that most work does not involve allowing strange men to use one's private parts for their pleasure. The Left has a problem with not wanting to see what is right in front of its nose. Rather than examining uncomfortable truths, they shout down anyone with a dissenting opinion, labeling them a "SWERF" or a "TERF."

The extreme right being patently awful does not mean that the regressive left is wonderful, a proclamation which is but one of the logical fallacies that those among the regressive left love to cling to. Identity politics is a mired, unexamined mess rife with individuals thinking that if they scream their insults loudly enough, reality will just go away. Anyone who has an opinion differing from the very loud SEX WORK IS WORK! TRANS WOMEN ARE WOMEN! screed is not just a person who disagrees with one's position, they are the ENEMY and must BE DESTROYED! 

The Reactionary Right

I dunnow...the guy holding up the Fag University sign looks like he might just be daydreaming about attending Fag University. Maybe he's not one of the protesters. He might be there promoting a gay sex club.

The Regressive Left

"Sex work is empowering."

"Trans women are women." 

(Never any outraged signs proclaiming that trans men are men.)

"Violent rhetoric isn't violent as long as you slap 'swerf', 'terf,' or 'white' in front of your violent rhetoric."

Part of the Problem:

This genius, and everyone who believes this foolishness without question

As long as the Left is more interested in slapping labels on people than in examining problems with the current (regressive) progressive agenda, there is more than a small chance that if Trump is not impeached, he will be re-elected in 2020. If not Trump, then another awful reactionary stands a good chance of taking the presidency; someone who adheres to many of the same terrible ideas as Trump but is competent enough to enact them.

The Left needs to back away from the identity politics and the foolish slogans and focus on actual solutions to resolve poverty and homelessness, to make health care available to everyone, to lower housing costs, and to create jobs and a living wage. We need to bring the manufacture of U.S. products back to the United States. The Left also needs to acknowledge its classism and elitism. Hillary Clinton was perceived as being both classist and elitist. Even though Trump is obviously both of those things, he managed to use Clinton's seemingly snobby attitudes regarding blue-collar workers to his advantage.

Instead of screeching that anyone who had a problem with Hillary Clinton was a sexist (and yes, there was sexism involved in people's perceptions of her), the wise course of action would be to table the sexism accusations and instead focus on her other attributes as a candidate. The Left needs a candidate who cares about the "unsexy" people, the blue-collar workers, the stay-at-home mothers, the farmers, the service workers, the elderly, the disabled. Drop the identity politics and get to the core of the problem. The rest can be worked out when everyone has their basic needs taken care of.

The Left needs a candidate who says: "I care about getting your basic needs taken care of," not one who caters to vocal and problematic fringe groups with cultlike behaviors.

Acknowledging the problems with the Left is not the same thing as being a reactionary. I am very much a liberal with live-and-let-live attitudes. But when the so-called "progressives" want me to die because I refuse to kowtow to their, frankly, insane screed, to shut up and toe the line or suffer emotional and possibly physical attacks, I am not going to stand by and support their behavior.

I am not going to stand silent and support the destruction of freedoms that I have fought for without a fight, and I will not support any candidate who enables the destruction of these freedoms, even if said candidate is touting her or himself as The Biggest Liberal Of Them All.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Image copyright juliahenze @123rf.com

Sly's WTF Wednesday: Clearly We are Fucking Doomed

The daily paper at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) has issued a disclaimer in deference to the transgender community with a recent article preemptively apologizing for saying women menstruate. ~ 

From the article posted in The Daily Caller News Foundation, July 22, 2015, by reporter Blake Neff

Barrett, Ruth. Female Erasure: What You Need To Know About Gender Politics War On Women, the Female Sex and Human Rights (p. 272). Tidal Time Publishing, LLC. Kindle Edition.

The more I saw of crap like this, the more the cracks started to show in the TRA agenda and the blinding light of TRA misogyny poured through.

For years, I blindly supported the TRA agenda, apologizing for being a "cis" woman, calling myself a "cis" woman, parroting "trans women are women," scolding radical feminists who refused to kowtow to TRA demands. 

Then came terms like "non-men," "menstruators," and "non-prostate-havers."

Then came the realization that you never see signs proclaiming that "trans men are men."

Then came the realization that use of neutral biological terms like clitoris, vagina, vulva, and uterus were being called "violence against trans women." (What???)

Then came the realization that not only was TERF a slur, but it was also a call to violence.

Then I saw the TRA Cult for what it was.

The same old MRA Misogyny covered in glitter.

And on that day, I hit Peak Trans.

OctPoWriMo 2019: Day 11: Silence the Dissenting Bitches

Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

in the echo chamber

chamber at the center

center of the chaos

chaos when you enter

the noise of your mindless mind

mind that you mind your p's and q's, bitches

bitches submit to the muzzle

muzzle the dissenting witches

gag them from the first unwanted kiss

kiss, just kiss, move on her like a bitch

bitch don't want it, what the bitch want don't matter

matter one iota if you get to scratch your itch

no respect for women, you can do anything

anything you want so long as you're a star

star in your own movie in your narcissistic head

head right off to prison and be a star behind bars

~Sly Has Spoken~

Notes:

This eviscerating verse was snarled out by Cie's badly behaved radical harridan alter-ego, Sly Fawkes, who wishes to remind you of the following words spoken by Emperor Commodus Trump and caught on tape. Sly is thrilled that The Humiliation of the American People appears to be going down in flames, and she has popcorn, hot dogs, and marshmallows ready to roast over the impeachment inferno.

“I moved on her like a bitch, but I couldn’t get there. And she was married.”

“I did try and fuck her. She was married.”

“Just kiss. I don’t even wait. When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything.”

“Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything.”

Image copyright juliahenze @123rf.com

Real Cie Reviews + FOAD Thursday: Harassment is Sexy and Fat People Aren't Even Human

Rating: Since there ain't no zeros, I'll give you a one

Nora Roberts' Nightshade is a trope-laden mess. Initially, I enjoyed the "hard-boiled detective narrative from a female perspective," but, fairly quickly, the cracks began to show.

I became tired of the male protagonist disrespecting the female protagonist's comfort zones and this being written as sexy rather than as harassment. She was not only supposed to endure it, but she was also supposed to enjoy it. Because nothing is hotter than a guy who won't take no for an answer.

The icing on the unpalatable cake was the "disgusting fat cat lady" who "had two chins and was working on a third," and the hero could see "at least two hundred pounds of bulk under her dress." This woman proceeds to "rub one of her chins."

I thought that Eleanor the cat lady was the most interesting character in the whole mess. I would have enjoyed reading Eleanor the Cat Lady's story. I would like a whole series of Eleanor the Cat Lady stories, where Eleanor is written as an interesting, eccentric, large human being, not a revolting, sub-human stereotype.

How hard would it have been to say that a large, elderly woman answered the door, and the hero could see several cats lying in the windows and on the furniture? The personable lady smiled and invited the hero in for cake and coffee. She was wearing a loudly colorful tunic which she may have made herself.

How easy it would have been to make the character both large and eccentric without being hateful.

Fuck Nora Roberts, and fuck every author who can't write a large character without insulting and dehumanizing them.

So done with this shit.

Cie does not recommend this book and she is unwilling to even share a link to this book even though she needs every cent she can get her broke-ass hands on.

Reactionary Left Groupthink Smells Like 1984

Doublethink

The keyword here is blackwhite. Like so many Newspeak words, this word has two mutually contradictory meanings. Applied to an opponent, it means the habit of impudently claiming that black is white, in contradiction of the plain facts. Applied to a Party member, it means a loyal willingness to say that black is white when Party discipline demands this. But it means also the ability to believe that black is white, and more, to know that black is white, and to forget that one has ever believed the contrary. This demands a continuous alteration of the past, made possible by the system of thought which really embraces all the rest, and which is known in Newspeak as doublethink. Doublethink is basically the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.

— Part II, Chapter IX – The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism

The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism, credited to the character Emmanuel Goldstein, is the fictional book that is a thematic and plot element in Part 2, Chapter 9 of the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984), by George Orwell. 

When applied to the TRA madness, men are women, women have penises, biological sex is a social construct rather than physical reality, and if you believe otherwise, you will be branded a TERF and ostracized. Never mind that in a medical setting, denial of biological reality can be harmful and even deadly.

Further, women who do not want to have sex with people who have penises (lesbians) are transphobes and should be bullied and made to feel bad for their sexual preference according to the TRA screed, and the reactionary left does not seem at all bothered by the severe homophobia inherent in this assertion. 

Ten years ago, nobody claimed that trans women were literally biological women. Everyone knew that they were biologically male, but it was understood that their dysphoria regarding their sex was so severe that the only way they could overcome it was to have surgical procedures and hormone treatments to make their bodies resemble female bodies. Liberal-minded people felt that tolerance and inclusion was the best option with regard to transgender people. 

Ten years ago, no-one used idiotic and dehumanizing terms like "menstruators" in reference to women. It also astounds me that very few people have caught on to the fact that no such dehumanizing terms are applied to biological men. You never hear anyone insisting on terms like "sperm producers." The reactionary left never questions why erasure of women is okay, but no-one is insisting on similar erasure of men.

There is plenty of insistence that "trans women are women" and should, therefore, be allowed to co-opt feminism and any woman who is resistant to this notion is a TERF and deserves to be bullied.

I have never seen a "trans men are men" sign. In fact, trans men tend to only be mentioned when doing so somehow benefits certain pushy TRA women.

Not supporting the insane TRA groupthink agenda is not transphobia. It is a refusal to be drawn into a very frightening, McCarthyist level of forced conformity to harmful ideals. One can be both supportive of the very real struggles of trans people and opposed to the current TRA culture which does far more harm than good, particularly where vulnerable young people who may be questioning their sexuality are concerned.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Image copyright juliahenze @123rf.com

Sly's FOAD Thursday: To All The Asshole Ex-Boyfriends Who Abused Me: Fuck Off and Die

This is my response to a post on Feminist Current. One of the topics was misogynistic behavior towards pregnant employees at Google. 

The tech industry is guilty of a lot of misogyny. I worked in tech for a little over a year back in 1997. I tried to be "one of the guys" because I had very low self-esteem and wanted to fit in. I also had as yet undiagnosed type 2 bipolar disorder and was drawn to chaos, possibly because I really had never known anything else. I was in my early 30s, but I was very naive.

 I fell in with a very interesting crowd. They all watched a lot of porn. The only other female in our little group was in an open marriage. She came from a very messed-up background. Her mother prostituted herself sometimes and had sex in front of her young daughter.

I made two big mistakes. The first was going to a Halloween party at this lady's house, but the bigger one was bringing along my ex-boyfriend whom I'd just broken up with because I wanted to be "open-minded" and show that we could "still be friends." He had been verbally abusive to me, but I felt guilty about breaking up with him.

Sometime during the party, one of my co-workers kissed me. The kiss was consensual, although I wouldn't have done it if I hadn't been completely smashed. My ex-boyfriend started making a scene, and I made two more big mistakes.

I didn't want my ex-boyfriend to get in a fight with my co-worker, so I drove drunk back to my apartment. I thought my ex-boyfriend had left. I crawled into bed with my clothes on. I woke up with my clothes off and him on top of me. I yelled (or slurred) at him to stop. When he was done, he said: "well, now we're back together again."

I had horrific panic attacks one after another for a year afterward. The doctors tried to medicate me, but I tend to have paradoxical responses to medications and most of them only made the panic attacks worse. Xanax made me suicidal. My family told me "well, you got over this sort of thing before, you can do it again." (I had been sexually assaulted when I was 18 by a guy I met while waiting in line for concert tickets. That one told me he hoped I would get pregnant so we'd have to stay together.)

I never went to the police. I knew they'd only say I deserved it because I was drunk and I let him into my apartment.

I was in an extremely vulnerable state of mind, and that's when another pervert predator struck. I've mentioned that one before. He is the one who would force me to watch bestiality videos and to kiss his feet under the threat that he would withdraw his "love" from me. He flaunted another girlfriend in front of me. I ended up with scars on my arms that will be there for the rest of my life because I couldn't imagine life without this creep and I cut my wrists.

Not that other industries don't have their creeps and abusers, but the tech industry is rife with them. The guy who raped me was in school to get a degree in programming as well.

I'm not saying every man in the tech industry is guilty of misogyny. I am saying there is a lot of misogyny in the tech industry.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Image copyright juliahenze@123rf.com

I didn't want to

I didn't want to

I didn't want to!

I know this song could never be made today, and I know that some of the lyrics are not politically correct, but their heart was in the right place and the song made me laugh when I really needed to. R.I.P. Brad Nowell and Lou Dog. Hope you're having fun on the other side, writing more bawdy songs with heart.

More Thoughts Regarding the Negative Effects of Porn on Girls

protectyoungwomen

 mysteriodontpullout

i think a lot of us are lowkey traumatized by the amount of porn we were exposed to as children and it's a very weird place to be in because generations before ours weren't in a situation where so easily you were unwillingly exposed to pornography. and now if you point out children should not have access to porn you're a prude because we are trying desperately to convince ourselves it was okay and it didn't affect us in a negative way but it did. it did and it's our responsibility to stop this from happening to younger generations

 slysfreespeechspace

More than lowkey. Even the softcore stuff led me to realize that women and girls are not seen as people, they are seen as toys for men to play with. The hardcore stuff really messed with me. I’ve never been able to feel normal about sex. My self-esteem was always terrible because I didn’t look anything like the women in porn magazines or movies. This led me to believe that I was lucky if any guy, no matter how abusive and horrible he was, showed interest in me. I put up with a lot of abuse.

There was one guy who was a huge misogynist and who enjoyed really sick, awful porn, not just people banging. He was into bestiality and forced me to watch it and to kiss his feet. I will never be able to get those images out of my mind. I finally worked up the nerve to get away from him, but it was not anywhere near soon enough.

Source: mysteriodontpullout anti porn 

Sly's WTF Wednesday: Can we PLEASE Stop Pretending Prostitution is Empowering and Transing is Perfectly Normal

The graphics are from Peak Trans Moments, and this story is VERY graphic. Do not read if you have a weak stomach.

Former nurse here.

This individual (the transgender prostitute) is severely damaged goods, allowing themselves to be used as a cum dumpster. What kind of sick fucking predatory freak would want to stick their dick into an ileostomy stoma? What the actual fuck?

Some people are so completely morally bankrupt. It’s as if there is nothing human about them anymore. Complete and utter disdain for those they would stick their dick into, which often means women. It is no compliment if one of these nasty-ass men says he wants to fuck you.

I feel bad for the person this damaged individual latched onto. I feel bad for the damaged individual thinking it’s okay to be treated like garbage this way. Now, can we PLEASE stop pretending that prostitution is “empowering” and that there isn’t anything awry in the psyche of a person who wants to identify as the opposite sex? Something made them dysphoric. We should be trying to understand it, but we should not be humoring people who obviously have serious mental health issues. This doesn’t help anyone.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Image copyright juliahenze @123rf.com

Real Cie Reviews: Wyrm's Warning

Note to Sly's Feminist Book Reviews readers:
This novelette is not specifically targeted as a feminist story, but I have chosen to share it for a couple of reasons.

First, the heroine is a realistic young woman who has to endure terrible behavior by awful, entitled men with very little chance of being able to retaliate. She lives in a feudal society where women are seen as property to be done with as males see fit. There is no respect at all for women and girls, but the heroine, Tala, still manages to shine, not because of superhuman abilities but because of a genuine strength of character.

Second, the author is genuinely thoughtful in his writing of female characters. His motivation is not lurid or prurient. He manages to both realistically portray the wretched way that girls and women were treated in medieval society and to create a heroine who shines without being a Strong Female trope. Although the story was not written with the intent of being a feminist story, it contains feminist elements and is respectful to its female characters.

Rating: 5 of 5 stars

The following is a duplicate of my review on Amazon and Goodreads for this novelette.

The author really knows how to get inside his characters' heads and describe their motivation. Unlike many male authors writing a female character, he doesn't linger on unnecessary descriptions of her anatomy. Tala is an ordinary young woman who lives in a time and place where women are treated as objects to be done with as males see fit. She faces manhandling by the old woodsman whom she is attempting to assist, and worse from the realm's boorish prince and corrupt priest.

One night while leaving the old woodsman's cottage, Tala is attacked by an unknown creature and mysterious changes begin to take place in her life, subjecting her to moments of terror and rage as she tries to comprehend what is happening.

Tala is a brave and level-headed young woman who faces truly awful situations both from the supernatural realm and the natural world in which she resides. Although there are uncomfortable scenes in this story with regards to men's treatment of women and girls as sex objects to be used as a man sees fit, these scenes are never gratuitous or unnecessarily explicit. 

There are jokes about male authors writing women in an overly sexualized fashion. Michael J. Allen manages to avoid being on the receiving end of the joke by writing his female characters with empathy rather than salacity.

I finished this story in one afternoon. It is a compelling page-turner.

~Cie~

Letter by Tavistock Clinicians Suppressed by The Guardian

This letter sent to The Guardian by Tavistock clinicians concerned with the health risks that come with transing children was never published. The Guardian, like other mainstream media, is afraid of upsetting their masters, the TRA cult.

Read the letter at Transgender Trend, a group committed to exposing the TRA lies and harms.

My guess is the main reason girls want to or are pushed to transition is not wanting to be treated the way girls and women in modern society are treated. I know I didn't want to be. I secretly started identifying as a feminist when I was eight years old. I was labeled a "tomboy," which I hated. I would always say: "my name isn't Tom, and I'm not a boy."

The concept of "penis envy" made me see red. During my prepubescent years, the only thing I thought a penis would be useful for was being able to stand up to pee and not have to drop my trousers and crouch behind a tree when my family and I went hiking, risking being seen by a passerby or getting poison ivy on my butt.

Once I hit puberty and started my period, a hell which would continue every 3-4 weeks for the next 40 years, I would joke that I wanted to turn into a fabulous gay dude every week until my period was done. His name would be Karl, and somehow, even though I was a dumpy, frumpy, very plain Jane, Karl would be beautiful and amazing and all the guys would want him. I wasn't serious about this, I just hated my period.

These days, I'm quite sure I would have been pushed to transition, even though if I was asked I would have affirmed that I was perfectly fine with being female, it's simply that I hate how girls are treated.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Image copyright juliahenze @123rf.com

Sly's Feminist Book Club: The Emergence of the Movement Lesbian

I intend to review this book myself. However, I have not done so yet. I am currently reading "From Liberty to Magnolia," which is the autobiography of Janice Ellis and details her struggles both as a black girl growing up in the racist Southern United States prior to the Civil Rights Movement and her work within both the Civil Rights and Feminist movements.

In the meantime, please read this well-written review of the featured book. This is my response:

A lot of people don't remember or don't realize just how difficult it was for gay people in times past. The 1990s was when I first started seeing acceptance by the general public and the idea that homosexuality was not deviant or a form of mental illness began to take hold.

As both women and homosexuals, lesbians have faced extreme backlash. There is an unspoken expectation that women will become wives and mothers, the organizers of the husband's household and the producers of the next generation. Like all women, lesbians are objectified in pornographic scenarios. Stereotypes still exist that all lesbian couples consist of a butch "husband" and a femme "wife". Lesbians still struggle with not being seen as people.

I feel very passionate about the subject matter in this book. Although I am not a lesbian myself, I am a feminist and an ally. Lesbians continue to be scapegoated today in many of the same ways they were scapegoated in the past.

Thank you for this well-written review of an important scholarly work which is likely to be overlooked by the general public.

This was my comment on the Book of the Day's Facebook page:
A lot of people don't remember that homosexuality was once widely considered to be "deviant" and a form of mental illness. Lesbians faced double the backlash from both homophobia and sexism.

Women are expected to bear and care for the next generation. Although a lesbian couple is certainly capable of raising a child, the expectation of the general population is that girls will grow up to find and marry their Prince Charming, have 2.5 children with him, and will manage the household. Lesbians receive backlash for disrupting that stereotype.

Further, lesbians are objectified by male pornography, and there continues to be a pervasive idea that all lesbian couples have a butch "husband" and a femme "wife." Books like this are very necessary for breaking down those stereotypes.

Note: some brain trust actually commented that he was "not a fan of lesbians." I refrained from getting into a flame war. I wanted to tell him that I'm not a fan of closed-minded, homophobic bigots.

This was my comment on the book club president's Linked In page:
Although homosexuals overall face less backlash in Western society than they did in times past, lesbians face not only homophobic but sexist backlash.

Lesbians are objectified in pornography which is made for men. They are stereotyped by the belief that a lesbian couple is supposed to have a butch "husband" and a femme "wife." Further, although a lesbian couple is perfectly capable of raising a child, lesbians defy the expectation that little girls are supposed to grow up, find their Prince Charming, have 2.5 children with him, and manage the family's household in the suburbs. "Are you sure you just haven't met the right man yet" is a phrase that many lesbians are still subjected to.

I'm always pleased when books like this one are featured. It has historical value and also addresses a problem which continues to plague society, although it is less prevalent and more covert than it was in the past.

~Sly Has Spoken~

Image copyright juliahenze @123rf.com

Exposure to Porn and PTSD in Girls and Women

Image by Alexas_Fotos from Pixabay

This post may be a bit of a hodgepodge. Bear with me.

The following are comments on a post at Feminist Current regarding PTSD in female adolescents caused by repeated exposure to online pornography. Comments from The Real Cie are my thoughts.
People with mental illness as a whole are being let down by the mental health system.
People with PTSD are being let down by the mental health system.
Women and girls are being let down by the mental health system.
The mental health system needs to be overhauled. However, in a society where people with disabilities are made pariahs and forced into poverty and health care is placed out of reach for many people, I don't foresee changes coming anytime soon.

Pet peeve time:
The word "womxxn" makes my eyes go crossed and my brain go stabby. There are no "womxxn". There are only women. Stop doing this!

Sarah aka Anemone • a day ago

minor correction: Bessel van der Kolk is male.

This is such an important subject. I spend way too much time online because I'm isolated 

due to disability and trauma, and I have to say it's actually helped me with some things, 

but it's never the same as healthy in-person relationships. Unfortunately most of us live in large

 cities where it's hard to connect with people. I think we are going to have to redesign cities so 

they are more people friendly, less car-friendly, both in terms of urban design and in terms of 

social structures, so people can connect with more people irl.

That might help with preventing online trauma, but unfortunately, that won't help with trauma

 in the family, which pushes some of us online. I watched a TED video recently (

Watch the video

by Nadine Burke Harris, who talked about ACE scores and how revolutionary it is to know that 

adverse childhood experiences contribute so much to physical health down the road, but when it 

comes to public response, crickets. People find trauma too hard to talk about. I lost my family 

because people find trauma too hard to talk about, so they'd rather push me out than deal with it. 

I guess that's where people who can deal with trauma need to step up.

therealcie  Sarah aka Anemone • 16 minutes ago

"I'm isolated due to disability and trauma."

Me too. People like us are very vulnerable, and I'm fully aware that no-one gives a flying shit.

Hella Dea • a day ago

You know the stages of grief charts.
I would really like one made for womxxn with ptsd.

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  therealcie  Hella Dea • 12 minutes ago
  

  
  

  Unless the PTSD is addressed and worked on, I don't know that there are stages for it other than "acute" and "always there fucking up your life forever." 
• Anyway, those are the two stages I've experienced with it, and addressing and working on it isn't as easy as it sounds when there are monetary and other barriers to finding a therapist. When it comes to therapists, I've had bad experiences and don't trust them damn crooked vultures. I've also found that there is a lot of sexism in therapy and often women's trauma is written off as "female hysteria."
• 
  
• Springheeledjim • a day ago
  " Studies increasingly show that the way young people consume social media, 24/7, is not only leading them to feel less socially connected, but also leading them to decreased mental wellness. "
  
  I'd agree with this.
  
  But as the father of a teenage girl who spends much of her life online, I don't necessarily think it's the sexualisation and pornification of the internet that is the biggest problem.
  
  Online bullying ( mentioned only in passing in this article ) is perhaps a bigger problem. And the feeling that everyone else is ' living their best life ' ( as the expression goes ) while you may be suffering from issues of self-esteem and/or worthlessness, or lack of direction... is perhaps a bigger problem still.
  
  I've already agreed on previous threads that young people have too much access to porn, and that it's warping their views on sexuality. I have no intention of revisiting that argument now. And I'm not saying that online porn is not a problem.
  
  But this article seems to be suggesting that it's the main reason why the internet is causing young teens mental health problems. And I don't think that's true.

therealcie  Springheeledjim • 23 minutes ago

Since you've made it clear that you enjoy porn and believe that full legalization of prostitution is a positive thing, I doubt you can possibly understand how porn can very negatively impact a young woman even if she is never drawn into it herself.

My father never treated me as a sex object (thankfully) but he had plenty of adult magazines around. I don't think the early Playboys had a negative impact. Early Playboy had art nudes as opposed to lurid pictures of young women fully spread-eagled and either leering at the camera or looking like a deer in the headlights.

My father's attitudes towards porn made me realize quite early on that all men, even good men like my father, see women as nothing but pieces of ass. It was upsetting, discouraging, and led me to realize that my father would side with creepy men over me, whom I became aware he saw as a second-class citizen. He may not have been aware of this himself, but he did see me and all women that way.

My father would always talk about women in terms of their physical appearance, not their accomplishments. Even as an adult, it was discouraging to me when he referred to Winona Ryder as "that plainest of plain Janes". Being quite a plain Jane myself, it cemented for me that my father saw women as things, not people.

I hope you will at least try to be a little careful of how you present your attitudes regarding women where your daughter is concerned. You may not realize it, but she is probably well aware that her father sees women as objects. You may be a good father in other regards, and I hope I am right in the belief that you do not sexually objectify your daughter. However, a man's attitude towards the objectification of women can have a lifelong impact on his female children. Your attitudes towards porn may be harming your daughter more than you realize.