Monday, October 16, 2017

The Crippling Patriarchy

For weeks, I have been on pins and needles to write this blog. I have written a lot about gender and domestic violence in the past. It always makes men uncomfortable. It puts them on edge because it's not the fluffy sexy stuff people want to read. Domestic violence is the unwelcome guest at any party. People feel terribly for an abused woman, but they want to remain at arms length because of the codependency and other issues the person often has.

I get it.

It's amazing how our culture promotes both domestic violence and rape. Straight men are literally raised with this toxic idea on how to perform masculinity. Gender is such a social construct that part of the reason DV is so constant is that men don't know how to behave. It's like they are so busy pounding their chests and asserting their manhood that some will do it at the expense of health and respect in the relationship.

There is always an idiot or two that says the woman pushed him. It's codependency, they push each other. It's a vicious cycle. Or they say she deserved it. No one deserves to be abused by a partner. And then they tell me I am bitter and to get over it. Yes, I am bitter the laws did more to protect my abusive partner than they did me.

No, I will not "get over it." If you have a friend or family member that is stalked or harassed by an intimate partner you never get over it. You are fucking furious.

It's amazing how much straight cisgender male culture promotes the slavery and entrapment of the straight cisgender female. Straight men do it unknowingly, even the good ones. I am by no means saying all straight men are evil. No, there are lots of good ones who are wonderful friends, brothers partners and fathers. But there is this construct that makes women subservient.

For instance, a man isnt a so called gentlemen if he doesn't pay for dinner. When I suggest both people split the check and get the relationship off on an equal footing women especially hate this. It's like they are not conditioned to be equal but demand it. And when they get it, they don't know what to do with it because they lose their status on the punishing end. It's always also assumed the man is the bread winner and has to take care of the woman. This is a terrible notion and a punishing one at that. It's an insult to people of both genders.

Then it is one set of rules for the man and the other for the woman. The man can parade his ex's around and speak about them at his leisure because he must mount his conquests on the wall. The woman when she speaks about hers isn't "over him." The second the woman says something about them she is demonized for her jealousy. Yet when the man says something about a woman's past partner he is asserting his manhood.

Lest we forget the cliche that a man can have as many partners as he wants and be king and a woman has as many partners as she wants and she is a slut. A lot of women slut shame not because they are even evil, but it's the internalized fear we have of the judgement and therefore we would rather have stones to throw at others rather than ourselves.

A man who is friends with all of his ex's is not a nice guy ever in my experience. This is a straight cis male enjoying being on the top of the patriarchy. This is a straight cis man parading his trophies. Often, this man is using these trophies as a way to keep his woman in her place, letting her know what came before her. When she gets jealous it's all her fault. It's like saying she deserved it because of what she wore, this is the same metric.

As a woman, we always fall into the trap of bad mouthing the woman before us, growing jealous. Meanwhile it is just the man's way of keeping us in our place. If we are jealous and do not focus on the fact he is trying to control us through the structure the paradigm has created, we cannot question his ineptness in the relationship let alone lack of so called manhood. This is just a mirage and distraction from the real issues.

More often than not, you should be weary of a man being friends with an ex. If there are children involved, it is understandable if they are friendly. You should be for the sake of children. While your relationship might not have been stable, you need to create a stable ground for the children.

But if the ex is regularly irking in without these factors, beware. This is a woman who is readying to do his dirty work upon the break up. She will too as as they are all tethered to the paradigm. He is the evil man behind the curtain and they are his demonic workers ready to torture you on command, and ready to again be a mirage to a larger social issue.

My view on DV is this, that the issue is not in fact with the fathers but with the mothers. Many times, women are taught to be more demure and kind in relationships. This means not standing up for themselves. When men with weaker mothers meet women who are willing to oppose them, this becomes too much for their challenged manhood. Therefore they lash out physically and emotionally.

I remember once as a kid I got into a fight with my brother about the clicker. (This dates me I know). My brother hit me because we were kids and sometimes you hit your siblings, it's what you do when you are 8 and 10. My mom came down on my brother like bloody hell fire. She said, "You have to do all your sister's chores. You could have hurt her."

When my brother protested, my mom informed him, "Someday that will be a girlfriend or wife. You will get in big trouble if you settle your disputes that way."

But the bigger issue is that we are so married to gender construct. This is why there is so much homophobia and transphobia. Because the LGBTQ crushes the straight cisgender construct. Actually this is for the best. Because gay relationships are much more equal than straight ones. Someone isn't always asserting their dominance and ultimately wanting the upper hand because of what is or isn't between their legs. While they have issues like every couple does, there is not the issue of gender dominance.

I find that many straight men accuse lesbians of "man hating" because they reject the notion of straight sex. Really and truly, these women experience sexism and homophobia at once. There are some who are on the defensive because they have been bullied by small minded cisgender men who don't realize that this is a situation where their manhood is not needed and it isn't personal.

A lot of cisgender straight women accuse butch lesbians of "not trying to be beautiful" because they don't wear dresses or makeup like such things make a woman beautiful. It's not wit, personality, or style. It's the clothes she wears and the man she fucks. YIKES! In my experience many butch women are the most beautiful people I have ever met inward and outward.

Then there is the transphobia that you have to be the gender you were born even if the gender doesn't fit who you are. You need to fit into the box of the social construct. Transfolk crush the social construct. They have found a way around it. They embrace fluidity. We should all in my opinion. I am not saying there is anything wrong with being straight and cis, but don't be so married to performing the roles you are given to the point where it makes you a toxic, bigoted, bully boy/girl asshole.

This post was in part inspired by a male comedian who wrote in effect that if women comedians market themselves as sexy they deserve to be disrespected by creepy bookers and harassed. It made me angry. Like the Harvey Weinstein victims deserved that predator as well. This is the straight patriarchy who serves and promotes rape culture and this idiot was just their facebook messenger.

In closing, Kleopatra killed herself because Augustus Caesar was going to take her captive. She didn't want to be his prisoner in chains and would not let that vicious patriarch win. Shakespeare tells it as a love story between her and Mark Anthony. This is the historical falsehood society has embraced because it makes Kleopatra in need of a man because therefore she is more feminine. If the truth were told, she would come from a position of strength. And that position of strength would be one more thing to challenge the patriarchy.

So yes, here is a sexy photo of myself that I took with my consent. It's red lingerie. Some will hate this blog and say I deserve to be assaulted. Others will hate me. Either way, I am not your prisoner in chains mutherfuckers. So take that rape culture, take it around your bloody fucking neck.



April Unwrapped

















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