From Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Novels, via Rachel Kramer-Bussel; and I’ll tell you up front, they were riffing off the AJC’s “Woman to Woman” column, which should prep you for exactly what kind of stupidity they were dealing with.
The funny thing is, the sorts of people who love to blame romance novels for the breakdown of the family are usually the ones who go on ad nauseam about the importance of personal responsibility, especially when it comes to social issues. Pregnant with an unwanted child? Gay? Brown and po’? SUCK IT UP, BECAUSE IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT TO BEGIN WITH, AND IF YOU TRIED HARD ENOUGH, YOU WOULDN’T BE ANY OF THESE THINGS. But once something like, say, violence in video games or the manly (but sensitive! Don’t forget they’re so sensitive!) heroes in romance novels rear their heads, they’re all for warning people off lest the poor, unsuspecting victims shatter their fragile psyches against the ramparts of oiled man-titty. As soon as blame can be attached to something that directly affects them, you won’t see a group of people so eager to pass on the buck. God forbid that the kids do awful things because they had shitty parents or because they’re being, y’know, kids, or that the woman left her husband because he’s a terrible spouse.
The rebuttal didn’t get my dander up quite as much as it did Sarah, but the derailment into Pornolandia made me raise my brow. I tend to question studies that claim violent porn increases propensities towards sexual violence–my gut feeling is that people who voluntarily seek out violent porn (not kinky BDSM stuff–I’m talking snuff porn and rape porn) on a regular basis probably are inclined in that direction to begin with. Linking causality for this sort of thing is incredibly tricky.
And all this clucking and flapping over female porn always makes me wonder: are female orgasms so terrifying? Seriously, why are people so damn worked up over women getting turned on and rubbin’ one out? Every time a woman masturbates, are TWO kittens killed instead of just one? I want to know, because I’d like to know how many kittens I’ve killed last week.
Sarah and Candy win at life.
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One Response to "Loving this post"
The Woman-to-Woman thing is just godawful. I read it and want to throw things. It’s just manipulative from top to bottom, making up pretend issues for women to fake fight about. Even the pictures piss me off–why is the demure conservative in a blouse, slacks and sensible shoes, while the trampy liberal wears a short skirt and high heels? Ugh.
Good for them for taking them on. Every time I read it I think about doing something like that but then I get pissed off and can’t bother to finish it.
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