misogyny

Periods happen. They just do. This is neither a good thing nor a bad thing. It’s just a thing. Like how hunger happens, or or a sneeze happens. It’s a body thing that… happens.

I decided to spend a few hours running errands in the summer sunshine while audaciously wearing a loose-fitting baby doll dress, comfy flats, and a denim vest. Apparently my need to keep my legs ventilated served as a Bat-Signal to the fine men of Gotham, who were drawn by its golden glow to yell stuff at me every five minutes.

I felt unique in my passion for martial arts, my affinity for Call of Duty, my go-with-the-flow attitude toward boyish adventures. I wanted to be “one of the guys,” while still retaining the distinction of my sexuality. I longed to be the quintessential cool girl — desirable yet approachable. But in retrospect, all that really amounted to internalized misogyny.

If I'm watching TV and I hear something that makes me think, "Oh man, I can't believe someone said that on TV — That is hilarious and on point!" you can bet your back hole I'm watching Full Frontal.

I saw my boobs as a way to get me into the secret world of feminine desirability, so I played them like they were my winning hand. I created an entire story about my sexuality that centered my breasts because they felt like the only normal — or maybe extraordinary — thing about my body. I think I hoped that I could use them to get some precious ween (obvi), but also to get MORE.

It was at about this time last year that the Free the Nipple movement first gained steam, as women and male allies around the world responded to Lina Esco’s critically-acclaimed film of the same name by staging peaceful — and, of course, topless — protests.

[CN: misogynistic online harassment; death threats; mentions of rape and child abuse] You shouldn't have to go to a great imaginative effort to humanize a woman to treat her like a human being. Spoiler alert — she's already a human being without you knowing her or caring for her or seeing her as a long-lost relative or even agreeing with her.

I’m lucky enough to be in a business where current events of this type make their way to me with relative frequency, especially when shared by Feministing. Today, of course, no exception.