A shout out to those of you on LiveJournal: I’m starting a new community for feminist writers. There are a several purposes to this community: to receive comments and criticism of your writing from fellow members, to dicuss writers and writing, to promote the published writing of community members, and to provide information about publishers seeking submissions of material which fits the scope of the community. So if you write fiction in your free time, or you just blog, please check it out. All genres and styles are welcome, including fiction, poetry, and nonfiction essays and articles!

Read the rules and decide if this is the community for you — it is not a exactly safe space, but there’s a lot of things I won’t put up with, either, because I truly believe there need to be some standards in order to maintain a “feminist” community and not a “debate with anti-feminists” community.

Apparently, Ally Work is hosting a carnival to erase racism. I didn’t know about this until now, since I’m apparently really bad at keeping up with these things. But there you have it. Good idea, hosted by some awesome people.

I didn’t really know about this until a day or two before, so I’m a little late. Whoops. Today we’re Blogging Against Disablism. (Although I’ve always heard “ableism”. Ah, well.)

I wasn’t at first going to do this. I thought, such short notice, I won’t have time, and what will I say? It seems like something I can’t talk about. I don’t really have any disabilities. I enjoy a great deal of privilege in that I can travel wherever I want, I am capable of walking for miles at a time. I’m in very good health. I don’t have dyslexia or any other learning disability which makes it difficult to focus, read, or write. I’m very fortunate.

But not everyone I know is. In fact, I’m so surrounded by people with various disabilities that, while I hardly even think about it (which is of course my privilege), it might seem downright odd to some people. I’m not trying to say this as a, “I have a token (insert whatever here) friend”, simply making clear that I do have a personal stake in this and it is something I am aware of in my life. It’s just… what could I say? What could I do? I don’t want to take the focus off of the people it should be on. I want them to tell their stories, to tell their point of view. It’s difficult to balance my attempts at advocacy work with not wanting to unintentionally undermine it. But this is an issue which I think is important and I will say something. As Goldfish has said, this isn’t a sexy topic like sexism or racism or heteronormativity. But it is important. And it’s necessary. Because so many people don’t think about it. So many people are completely unaware.

The whole phenomenon of ableism is largely invisible. That’s why it’s necessary to write about it. People with disabilities are invisible, too.

Have any of you able-bodied people ever gone anywhere with a friend in a wheelchair? They’re ignored. You’ll be asked to speak for them, or they will be addressed like children — exceptionally stupid children, at that. That’s if they’re noticed or seen at all. People think that staring is rude, so they don’t stare, instead they willfully overlook and pretend the person isn’t there. Staring may be rude, yeah, but invisibility is worse.

What’s necessary is not pretending that some people don’t have problems. You’re not going to help someone who can’t walk by leaving them on the ground and pretending they don’t have specific needs. Able-bodied people need to overcome their discomfort, swallow their pride, and accept that sometimes you have to make accommodations for people, but that doesn’t mean they’re children. That doesn’t mean they can’t take care of themselves, or that you know what’s best for them better than they do. It just means that you ask them if they need help, and give it if they need it. Respectfully, nonjudgmentally, politely.

The two extremes I see able-bodied people take again and again are either ignoring the problem and hoping the person disappears, or overcompensating and assuming it’s okay to try to control the person’s life since they obviously can’t do anything for themselves. It’s invisibility or total lack of personal autonomy. Neither is the solution and I don’t advocate the latter at all.

One example I have personal experience with. For most of last year, I worked in a school for gifted children with learning disabilities, basically doing grading and data entry. The kids here range from severely autistic, to uncontrollable ADHD. Most of them are very sensitive and prone to sensory overload, shutting down or panicking or freaking out if they are overstimulated. This school is very small, and caters to the specific needs of each individual child, encouraging them to advocate for their needs — if they can’t take the noise, they can wear headphones, if they can’t hold still, they’re given “fidgets”, objects to play with while they do their work. I found the job extremely rewarding, and the teachers, though they sometimes get worn out, are all very wonderful people. There were some administrative problems, I thought, things not being handled as smoothly as they could have been, but overall the approach was good. And it works. There have been so many children in the short time this school has been open who were hopeless cases, violent or suicidal, who have been encouraged to work at their own pace, to develop their own unique creative skills, to follow their interests, and the results have been amazing. These kids are encouraged to understand their bodies, their needs, their triggers, so that they can control themselves and adjust to their environment. They are not treated as if they are broken and need to be fixed; instead the approach is more to empower them to make informed choices and to take care of themselves to that they can be happy instead of depressed and overwhelmed. Some of these teachers are saints.

This is the approach that we all need to take in combating prejudice against ableism. We need to be understanding and sympathetic to everyone’s individual needs, be they emotional, mental, or physical, and we need to do this all with respect and kindness. It doesn’t matter if the able-bodied among us don’t personally experience prejudice, because it is there, and anyone who thinks that prejudice is wrong can be an ally, so long as we realize that “ally” does not mean “savior” and it does not mean “surrogate parent”.

Blogging against heteronormativity!

From Wikipedia:

Heteronormativity is a term used in the discussion of sexual behavior, gender, and society, primarily within the fields of queer theory and gender theory. It is used to describe (and frequently to criticize) the manner in which many social institutions and social policies are seen to reinforce certain beliefs.

These include the belief that human beings fall into two distinct and complementary categories, male and female; that sexual and marital relations are normal only when between two people of different genders; and that each gender has certain natural roles in life. Thus, physical sex, gender identity, and gender roles should in any given person align to either all-male or all-female norms, and heterosexuality is considered to be the only normal sexual orientation. The norms this term describes or criticizes might be overt, covert, or implied. Those who identify and criticize heteronormativity say that it distorts discourse by stigmatizing alternative concepts of both sexuality and gender and makes certain types of self-expression more difficult.

I have an anecdote to share: my ten-year-old brother, sweet, perceptive child that he is, one day remarked as we were watching commercials on TV, “Why do they only show straight couples?” (Sort of like the time he asked why human beings are called “man” and “mankind” since we’re not just made of men — yes, my siblings are pretty awesome.)

“That’s called heterocentrism,” I replied. “Being straight is all you see because it’s what everyone is assumed to be.”

“That’s stupid,” he said.

I agree.

Another anecdote: in my fiction, several of my central characters in my ongoing projects are queer. I don’t know how many times I’ve had parents/older authority figures/whoever ask me why “all my stories are gay”.

My stories aren’t all gay. Some of my stories don’t have any queer characters at all, some only have a few. The ones in which queer characters are the main ones are of course going to have a greater emphasis on and representation of queers — because we tend to like to make friends with at least some others who share our concerns and experiences. I think I overall have a 50-50 split in my representation of straight vs. gay characters. Perhaps not even that; my trans characters in my novel are technically straight girls, GLBT or not.

People ask me why I’m into slash and why I “choose to write gay love stories”.

Why do straight people choose to write about straight characters?

Everything I read is about straight people. I have been known to be subject to the occasional bout of heterosexual attraction; I think male/female couples are perfectly good writing material. (Even better than straight ones, though, are queer male/female couples. Just because you’re in a “straight” partnership doesn’t mean the individuals participating aren’t queer. Bi and pansexuals do exist. Sometimes, pretty fucking rarely unless they’re in the closet, homosexuals date people of the opposite sex, even — though I think lesbians seem to be more flexible on this point. Heteronormative assumptions strike again!)

Science fiction isn’t queer enough. It’s probably more queer than a lot of other genres barring stuff specifically aimed at a queer market. Speculative fiction that isn’t just science-based tends to be slightly more fabulous…but, still…

I write what I want to read. No one else is going to, so I should, right?

But it’s not “normal”. It’s not the “default”. Writing a book about a gay man suddenly makes me “weird”.

Why?

I am one of those people with the ability to read gay subtext into absolutely anything. (If queer media were prevalent enough, to be fair, I’d probably read straight subtext into that, too.) Half the movies I watch end up with me proclaiming how I think a character is gay or has a thing for another character of the same sex. I’ve read whole books secretly hoping a same-sex couple hooks up in the end, conveniently trying to ignore or downplay any heterosexual entanglements of which I am not fond. I played Kingdom Hearts and its sequel because of my desperate belief that Sora and Riku were meant to be with each other even though the love triangle actually involves their mutual crushes on the girl character, whom I despise (or, well, I did until the end of KH2, but that’s another story) and try to pretend doesn’t exist.

If the possibility isn’t explicitly precluded by the plot, or if I don’t like the male/female couples in a story, I’ll read gay subtext into everything I see. No one except maybe my sister and my friend Megan can really spot the covert homosexuality in just about anything the way that I can.

People think I’m nuts.

Perhaps, perhaps not, but I’ll tell you what this means, what it says about me — it’s a coping strategy. It’s my way of coping with the fact that most of the mainstream movies I watch don’t include people like me or my friends, except as a sexless footnote or a freakish joke. I do watch a lot of queer film and read a lot of queer lit, but not always, not exclusively — how could I, and why? It’s just so frustrating to know that, in most mainstream media, I’m either an abnormal anomaly or my existence isn’t even considered as a possibility. I think that has been getting better, but it’s still pretty bad.

The media’s probably the place where I feel most represented, as a matter of fact, because there are movies that at least acknowledge that gay people exist (in however clumsy or offensive a fashion). It’s the day to day experience of life that exasperates me. Unless I’m in the company of other queers, most people seem to be utterly ignorant about even the possibility of homosexuality, and if they think it exists, they just have to tell me their bizarre, totally offensive, and utterly flawed theories about it. They don’t even acknowledge people who aren’t monosexual.

And these theories on why people become gay? They are flawed because they conform to heteronormative theories of personality because, of course, most straight people can’t think outside of that box — which is understandable (hell, I don’t understand straight people, I can’t think in the heteronormative box), but annoying as all hell. For example:

Lesbians become what they are because they either have been abused by men or can’t find a man who wants them or are in some other way embittered. They just need to find the right one.

Weird oedipal shit about men being raised by women so they identify with the feminine gender role, not having proper masculine role models, or vice versa with queer women, blah blah blah, I’m sure you all know it.

Or, one that I’ve heard which is especially offensive because it acknowledges the validity of the trans and intersex experiences at the expense of the rest of us: that homosexuals are really just physically or mentally the opposite gender they think they are and once they realize that they can become perfectly happy heterosexual members of society. (The woman my dad is seeing explained this theory to him, which she believes, along with the conviction that bisexuality isn’t real; he told her never to say anything like that in my presence, ever, and then tried to explain to her why that’s totally wrong. Sigh. But at least my family members are cool.)

So I guess all I’m trying to say is, I’m not abnormal or unnatural, I’m just me, and I do exist. I kind of like to construct a world around me which reflects that, through my writing, my art, and through my interpretations or critiques of what other people have to say. Apparently, many straight people in my life can’t understand why I do this.

It’s their loss, I suppose. They’re the ones limited by that worldview, and unless I buy into it or let them upset me (too much), it doesn’t have to affect me.

But — ARGH! It’s so frustrating to be treated like a freak or have my experiences invalidated. How many guys hit on a girl even more after learning she identifies as lesbian because to them that means she’s into hot bisexual threesomes? How totally offensive is that?

And why does it matter? If I don’t allow people to safely assume I’m straight, and neither to put me in a narrow box of whatever they believe the alternative is, THEY. FLIP. OUT.

It’s terrifying to them. It’s a personal affront!

Whatever.

I’d rather be queer.

Blogging to raise awareness about sexual violence.

If you’re not angry you’re not paying attention.

How many of you know someone who’s been the victim of sexual violence? How many of you know someone who’s been raped?

How many of you think you don’t know anyone who’s a survivor? I’ll bet you do. I’ll bet you don’t even know it.

People always seem surprised that I can be so passionate, so angry. I’ve never been raped, right? So why should I care? The statement is baffling, the sentiment downright insulting. Why shouldn’t I care? I’m angry that people live in poverty and starve to death even though I do not. I’m angry about a lot of things I have never personally experienced and hope to keep that way. What kind of person can simply not care when others are in pain simply because it does not affect them personally? (Don’t answer that. I’m not asking because I don’t know. I’d really rather not think about it.)

If you’re not angry you probably just don’t realize why you should be.

I have friends who have been raped, you know. Too many. I know girls raped by strange men in dark alleys, by their friends, by their fathers. Some of these women are my family. I know a man who was sexually abused by his mother throughout his childhood.

Mostly the blame sits on them, not their rapists.

How does a six-year-old girl “ask for it”? What sort of sick mind says a girl systematically abused for years by her father “led him on” or “made him do it”? That may horrify any thinking compassionate person, but that’s what this girl’s family said when she told my sister and my dad called the police. They lied and said they talked to the police, who wouldn’t investigate, so that she’d drop it. When we did contact law enforcement, suddenly, she was the bad one, she’d “broken up the family” and it was all her fault.

Why would a fourteen-year-old lie about being raped at night outside her home? Oh, right, to get attention. Making it all up so that she can be the center of attention, when…it’s so very obvious there’s something wrong. Her mother wonders why she’s suicidal, self-destructive, depressed? Oh, right, that’s for attention too. There couldn’t be a real problem there, now could there?

These are only some of the stories I know, and some of them I’m merely aware of.

It’s not that people I know have been hurt that makes me angry. It’s just that gives it a face. That makes it even more important. I was angry before, but knowing what’s happened to people I care about makes it worse.

How can anyone not care about violence? How can anyone think that the only reason to care is if one is a bitter victim? Must I know someone who’s been murdered to think that killing someone is horrible?

If you’re not angry you probably don’t realize just how pervasive sexual violence is in the world, or how little is being done to prevent and punish it.

Open the paper on any given day; you’ll see a story about rape or child pornography or human trafficking or sexual slavery or something. It’s everywhere. And no one ever talks about the real problem: that sexual violence is wrong. That seems obvious, tautological — so obvious, in fact, that it’s totally ignored and obvious no longer.

Instead the discussion shifts to what people should do to avoid it, when…no one should have to go out of their way to avoid what other people shouldn’t be doing. Idealistic, perhaps, but, legally, true. That’s why we have laws. Certainly, if someone is walking alone in a dangerous part of town and gets mugged, perhaps they had a lapse in judgment — but it’s not their fault, it was the fault of the person who took advantage of that and did something that was wrong. Our hypothetical victim here is not the one who broke the law, and the person who did ought to be punished whether or not the victim put themselves into a position of weakness.

I have a confession to make: I did this too, when my ex reported that she was sexually assaulted. I thought she had put herself into a dangerous situation which she should have been smart enough to avoid, and to some extent I still feel that way, but… it’s not her fault that he committed a crime. That doesn’t excuse what he did to her. I don’t care if she was high or if she should have been smarter than to be in a room alone with some creepy older guy, or if I was a little pissed that she didn’t listen when I told her not to do stupid shit because she’d get hurt; he shouldn’t have touched her. No one can ever be held responsible for the violent acts perpetrated by others, no matter what they did or didn’t do, “should” or “should not” have done. There are circumstances under which, perhaps, sexual violence could have been prevented, but it’s not the victim’s fault if it happened. It is never less wrong if the victim’s foresight and actions weren’t perfect or didn’t fit into some flawless formula. Questioning the thought process or actions of the victim only leads to shifting responsibility from where it actually belongs: the one who committed the crime.

Why aren’t more people angry? How can people honestly not be angry about the fact that sexually violent acts happen, every minute of every day, all over the world?

Why isn’t everybody outraged?

I know the answers to these questions, of course, and a critique of rape culture and the idea of women as a sex class will have to wait for another day. But I think that most people aren’t so malicious as those answers would imply. I think most people really…don’t notice, don’t see the problem, don’t understand why rape is wrong and what it does to people. It’s a crime so horrific that people want to pretend it doesn’t happen.

I said before if you’re not angry you’re not paying attention, and sometimes…it’s not that people are willfully ignoring things. It’s that they honestly don’t know. There’s such a stigma against the victims of sex crimes that many people never engage in honest dialogue about the subject. People repeat what they’re told without ever thinking about it.

So we need to talk. We need to repeat what people still haven’t heard, again and again until victim’s voices can be heard and not judged.

Are you listening?

Are you learning?

Are you paying attention?

Are you angry yet?