Where rape is concerned, talk isn't good enough.

I have a guest blog on The F Word. Hopefully it is not triggering, but it does concern rape and recent discussions of rape. If you'd like to read it, click here: http://www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2011/05/rape_in_the_media

What ludicrous distinctions, its obviously the same person. Oh, I didn't need to say that. This brilliant image makes the point all by itself.

"Business" is no excuse for prejudice

This scientific pictorial evidence confirms irrefutably that the "male brain" exists.

Today I'm mostly ranting about potential parental leave reforms at Labour Uncut. If that sounds half as overwhelmingly exciting to you as it does to me click here: http://labour-uncut.co.uk/2011/05/17/business-is-no-excuse-for-prejudice/

The awesome/outrageous unspecified intervals round-up.

As I spend so much of my time staring at this damn screen, I'm sharing some of my webtrawl findings. I won't promise to do it every week, as if it were some sort of weekly round-up. Any such promise would inevitably lead to the horror of trying to do it drunkenly after a night out. (LOL, they'll all love this picture of my foot + a 20000 word rant about my unsuccessful evening at *insert overrated gay club here*).

This, therefore, is the round-up of awesome/outrageous stuff I've found recently, which I'll post at least once and possibly again, not at weekly intervals but frequently, after unspecified stretches of time. You can call it the unspecified intervals round-up. Catchy.

Awesome:

Should you shave your legs? The quintessential feminist dilemma solved.

Rodrigo y Gabriela covering Stairway to Heaven. Speaks for itself really.

The Coalition Commemorative Calendar . Call me partisan, but this is pretty good. You can vote for the worst month, too.

Outrageous:

"The Thinking Housewife"

The Heretical Press . Scroll down for some truly enlightening essays by a genuine neo-nazi.

Awesome/Outrageous:

Gender Stereotypes Cloud. Awesome visually, outrageous in all other ways.

Lesbians are this season's new handbag. Mostly outrageous, but awesome in the classical sense.

SlutWalking is rooted in riot grrrl attitude

I was extremely (sexually) excited this week to have a piece published on The Guardian's Comment is free. Find it here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/may/09/slutwalk-feminist-activism

An image from a SlutWalk, or possibly an image from some sort of microwavable women's autonomy march. Not sure.

Also, here is a link to the official SlutWalk London website, now taking place on 11th June: http://slutwalklondon.tumblr.com/

A wolf in sheep's clothing (just a little rant)

"Peer pressure is a key contributor to early sexual activity in our country. Society is focused on sex. Teaching a child at the age of seven to apply a condom on a banana is almost saying: 'Now go and try this for yourself'. Girls are taught to have safe sex, but not how to say no to a boyfriend who insists on sexual relations."

- Nadine Dorries MP

Deceptions. Fictions. Dogmatic idiocy. Conservative MP Nadine Dorries is certainly a controversial figure. Tonight, Political Correctness Goes Mad takes an undercover* look into the sexual politics of the woman some call 'a psychotic, sexist lunatic' to find out - what the fuck is she thinking?

Hey, if we don't teach them about sex then maybe they will just never do it until they get married to nice vanilla heterosexual male-bodied people?

Last week Nadine Dorries MP managed to slime through a 'Ten Minute Rule Bill' on abstinence sex education. For girls only. I'm aware that there is not a hope in hell that this bill will become law, but still, the fact that it passed (67 to 61) is staggering.

Nadine Dorries MP's method is a little bit backhanded. She doesn't go directly for what she believes, having come to the rational conclusion that anybody with a brain cell will oppose the infliction of her prejudices onto wider society.

In this vein, the above quotation is strange. If not for the absurd and evidentially incorrect idea that teaching children how to put condoms on bananas will lead to an uncontrollable spate of young banana-rubbering hobbyists, one might even agree with it. Peer pressure does contribute to 'early', whatever this may mean, sexual activity. Girls are not taught how to say no to a boyfriend that insists.

Sure, we are taught that saying no is an option, but we aren't taught how to do it. We aren't taught how to say no when you're attracted to the other person and you want to fuck them but you don't have any means of getting protection. We aren't taught how to say no when you sort of want to, but you sort of don't want to, and you sort of think maybe another time might be better but you don't want to reject the other person completely and you don't want them to get angry. Dorries is also right insofar as we aren't taught to say no when the other person wants to and you totally don't. That's still a problem, and a serious one.

But we also aren't taught how to say yes, and this should be equally important. There are no lessons on saying yes when you want to have sex so badly and blood is pumping around your body and your cunt is a more pH neutral version of the Thames but you don't know how to convey to your (willing) partner that you also want to. Its difficult to know how to say yes when you're scared of being rejected, or called a slut, or that they might tell their friends at school.

Perhaps its different now, but in my day sex education focused solely on the conveniently erect penis going in the mysteriously self-lubricating vagina. ('When the penis goes in the vagina, the vagina becomes aroused and moistens') Really, sex education in 2001? What if your vagina prefers vagina, or what if you don't like penetration that much, or what if you need a bit more than that to get you off? Where in god's name is the discussion of the clitoris? What if you like to be tied down and spanked with a portrait of George Elliot whilst free jazz plays in the background? (this has nothing to do with my sex life, by the way)

Ok, so Nadine Dorries MP's conclusion from all these difficulties with navigating sexual exploration, is not that children need to be more comprehensively educated, but that we should attempt to stifle their burgeoning sexualities by TEACHING ABSTINENCE.

Sorry Nadine Dorries MP, but being taught to say no when you mean no, and yes when you mean yes, and how to do it differently when you need it to be done differently, has nothing to do with abstinence. Being taught abstinence suggests that sex is dirty, or wrong, or evil. This kind of 'education' has a counterproductive effect, heightening occurrences of rape, unwanted pregnancy, STD transmission, and generally unsatisfying sex because you haven't been taught how to do it at all, let alone how to do it well. This kind of ideology can't even really be described as education. It is the opposite to everything education should stand for: regressive, dogmatic, and ultimately, very very sexist.

That Dorries tries to wrap up her odious beliefs in slightly palatable seeming policy is all the more reason to oppose her. It is staggering that there are 67 people in Parliament who thought her ideas were reasonable rather than self-evidently GROTESQUE. We need to be constantly aware that these people still exist.


*Please note, by 'undercover' I mean that I'm writing this in bed. Now, back to practicing condom application on this bunch of phallic fruits.