The whole OSBP wank is consuming me. I tried to step away, tried to turn off comments and ignore the conversation, but my reaction to it has been unexpectedly visceral, and I just can't. People on my flist have been wonderful; their posts have been thoughtful and heartfelt and intelligent and often funny as hell. My reaction has been closer to the OH JOHN RINGO NO end of things. I've seen people saying that I never should've brought it up on the
dragoncon comm, that I'm just giving people ideas. I respect people's right to think that, but it seems wrong to me to avoid talking about something because it might give
men people ideas -- as if they're somehow not expected to be able to stop themselves from acting on ideas, like it's not their fault if they don't control their more base impulses. I'm sure this was not how people meant to sound, but it reminded me very much of the whole 'well, she was asking for it! Did you see how she was /dressed/? She wanted it!' defense against rape. And surprise, surprise, that exact thing turned up in
theferrett's original post. They started asking people
who were dressed scantily -- who were "displaying their assets" if they could grope them. Because, obviously, the only reason a woman dresses that way is to invite sexual advances. Apparently.
More than one person in the
dragoncon post has told me that they have the
right to ask women if they can grope them. The
right. That there's nothing at all wrong with 'just asking a question'. Two people have asked me in comments if they can grope me, even though I've made it clear that it's not okay to ask me (full disclosure: I deleted those two comments). So tell me, why is it a surprise that I worry that this game/project/gang-grope could get out of control in a setting like DragonCon? 50,000 people crammed into three hotels, many of them inebriated, some of whom think they have the right to ask to grope me even if I expressly have said that's not okay?
I'm physically ill just writing about it; I'm violently angry that we even have to have this discussion -- that there's even a question about whether this kind of thing is okay. I think I got comfortable in my mostly-female space online and forgot that there is this pervasive attitude in the world at large that my body is not entirely mine, that other people have a right to it in some way. That I'm a harpy and a shrew and a shriveled-up old feminazi if I say that this is a revolting idea.
( Cut for possible triggers. )This is not about me objecting to consenting adults exploring their sexuality. If this is something they want to do with like-minded people, that's great. I'm all for people having all the consensual sex they want. Be wild. Be kinky. Be vanilla. Be poly. Explore your own limits. Celebrate your sexuality. But be damned sure that when you do, you're not bringing people into it who have not consented to do so. It's
their right not to be confronted, questioned, cornered or coerced into something they didn't expressly ask for.
That's all.