Tuesday, September 9, 2014
Bird species ranges are shifting en-masse
It's waaaay too much hassle to actually cross-post, so I'm just going to link to the Bander-and-Barista post. It's here.
Wednesday, September 3, 2014
A rant about the state of the internet
In the aftermath of the hacked and leaked nude photographs of the multiple celebrities (mostly young and female), I feel the need to add my voice to the ever-growing chorus.
Taking advantage of a tragedy to make a point? OF COURSE I AM. What better time to talk about and emphasize the importance of smoke detectors than in the aftermath of a rash of house fires? What better time to talk about gun control laws than in the aftermath of a crazy guy with an assault rifle shooting up a movie theater? Why? Because humans have a very short collective attention span. This incident will hold America's collective attention for awhile because there were famous boobs involved.
The slut-shaming and victim-blaming have got to stop. Slut-shaming and victim-blaming, in general, need to stop... and this unfortunate incident has the bright silver lining of bringing up that point once again. This whole greasy stain on the fabric of decency comes down to two issues and two issues only.
Issue #1: Consent.
Issue #2: Female bodies, sexuality, and expression as public property.
Various news and blog articles have covered each of these issues in the last few days, but I wanted to touch on both of them in their larger societal contexts as well.
Consent.
In its most black-and-white form, most decent 21st century humans agree on this point. In a sexual context, if someone (male or female) says "no" and then fights back, there is a problem, and in a court, those two actions clearly show that the act was non-consensual. But what if the victim is unable to say "no" or fight back? Intoxication, unconsciousness, or even paralyzing fear will cause one or both of these obvious consent-revoking actions to be absent. What about a victim wanting to say "no" and fight back, but being unwilling to do so for fear of reprisal by a violent and physically overpowering assailant? An attack that began as a rape ends in murder often enough for this to be an understandable response. The concept of 'asking for it' is dangerous and insidious. Provocative attire, walking alone at night, even intoxication and drug use are on a long list of behaviors that do not indicate or replace consent. Even if consent is given initially, it can be revoked at any time. Period. Another area where consent can be revoked at any time is within the implied consent of a long-term sexual relationship (such as a marriage).
Consent is everything. It changes the exact same behaviors from welcome intimacy to traumatizing assault. The fact that the average human male can easily physically overpower the average human female is what makes this so important. "With great power comes great responsibility," says Spiderman's uncle. It doesn't just apply to mutant spider-bite superpowers, guys. All of this comes down to the sexual education of our young. We need to better teach girls to stand up for themselves and say "no", but we also need to teach boys how to accept "no". We try to teach our girls how to not be raped, but we haven't we taught our boys how not to be rapists.
So what does this have to do with some douche-bag leaking naked pictures of celebrities to all-and-sundry on the internet? Everything.
It's similar to the disturbing trend of 'revenge porn', except that this was done by a random stranger with hacking skills instead of an angry ex-lover with a grudge. As with revenge porn (when someone posts explicit or intimate photos of an ex on the internet without the ex's consent), photos like these are almost always taken with permission and freely given within the context of a loving relationship. Everything is fine. There are no sluts here. There is no 'asking for it'. Sharing these intimate aspects of a relationship with the great wide internet after the relationship ends (even if it ended badly) was not consented to, and is therefore as much sexual assault as rape. 'The Newsroom' (an Aaron Sorkin drama on HBO) addresses the revenge porn issue during a particularly poignant episode of its second season.
This travesty is even more cut-and-dried than that. This random stranger never had consent to view the photos in the first place (thus he had to hack phones and iCloud accounts to get at them), and he certainly never had consent to distribute them worldwide. If private financial information had been hacked and distributed, there would be no question as to the criminality of the action. The fact that it's private photos somehow makes the criminality uncertain. I can't even begin to understand that.
Again, it's all about consent, both the viewer and the person being viewed. If the viewer doesn't consent (a man exposing himself to pedestrians on the street), BOOP! onto the sex-offender registry with you. If the person being viewed doesn't consent (peeping toms and stalkers), BOOP! restraining order for you. But because revenge porn and celebrity photo leaks happen on the internet, and because there was consent at some point waaaay back in the process, nobody knows what to do.
Moving on.
Female bodies, sexuality, and expression as public property.
The examples and consequences of this issue are too numerous and widespread to mention them all. Restricting access to both birth control and abortions (at the same time) as an attempt to regulate and control female bodies and sexuality. Cat-calling and street harassment as an indication that a woman and her body are public property and open for comment. The 'third date rule' and similar ideas that entitle men to sex. Annnnnd the idea that hacking and releasing private photos of famous women was in any way ok. These women are famous, therefore I am entitled to see her tits. If the photos were intended to be the public property this maladjusted cretin assumed them to be, he wouldn't have needed hack them. And also, the men falling over themselves to find the photos once they were released. The photos exist, therefore I am entitled to see them.
The moral of this rant is, first, to cut it the hell out with the slut-shaming and the victim-blaming (I think I said that already). Second, in this new digital age where we have an infinite amount of information at our fingertips, most of us have at least some form of online presence and interaction with others, and everyone has a camera in their pocket, we need a new standard of law, morality, and decency. Or we need to follow the current standard along its logical extension into the digital realm. And third, a lot of these problems will fix themselves when we get over the shame and taboos about sex that we inherited as a society from our unfortunate Puritan founders. Taboos and shame wield terrible power in adults, and the only way to really get rid of them is to not teach them to our children. We need to give our children and young adults a proper sexual education that emphasizes safety and responsibility, consent and respect, pleasure and intimacy. Only then will the dregs of society be unable to hide behind the taboos to avoid justice and use the shame as a weapon of mass destruction.
Taking advantage of a tragedy to make a point? OF COURSE I AM. What better time to talk about and emphasize the importance of smoke detectors than in the aftermath of a rash of house fires? What better time to talk about gun control laws than in the aftermath of a crazy guy with an assault rifle shooting up a movie theater? Why? Because humans have a very short collective attention span. This incident will hold America's collective attention for awhile because there were famous boobs involved.
The slut-shaming and victim-blaming have got to stop. Slut-shaming and victim-blaming, in general, need to stop... and this unfortunate incident has the bright silver lining of bringing up that point once again. This whole greasy stain on the fabric of decency comes down to two issues and two issues only.
Issue #1: Consent.
Issue #2: Female bodies, sexuality, and expression as public property.
Various news and blog articles have covered each of these issues in the last few days, but I wanted to touch on both of them in their larger societal contexts as well.
Consent.
In its most black-and-white form, most decent 21st century humans agree on this point. In a sexual context, if someone (male or female) says "no" and then fights back, there is a problem, and in a court, those two actions clearly show that the act was non-consensual. But what if the victim is unable to say "no" or fight back? Intoxication, unconsciousness, or even paralyzing fear will cause one or both of these obvious consent-revoking actions to be absent. What about a victim wanting to say "no" and fight back, but being unwilling to do so for fear of reprisal by a violent and physically overpowering assailant? An attack that began as a rape ends in murder often enough for this to be an understandable response. The concept of 'asking for it' is dangerous and insidious. Provocative attire, walking alone at night, even intoxication and drug use are on a long list of behaviors that do not indicate or replace consent. Even if consent is given initially, it can be revoked at any time. Period. Another area where consent can be revoked at any time is within the implied consent of a long-term sexual relationship (such as a marriage).
Consent is everything. It changes the exact same behaviors from welcome intimacy to traumatizing assault. The fact that the average human male can easily physically overpower the average human female is what makes this so important. "With great power comes great responsibility," says Spiderman's uncle. It doesn't just apply to mutant spider-bite superpowers, guys. All of this comes down to the sexual education of our young. We need to better teach girls to stand up for themselves and say "no", but we also need to teach boys how to accept "no". We try to teach our girls how to not be raped, but we haven't we taught our boys how not to be rapists.
So what does this have to do with some douche-bag leaking naked pictures of celebrities to all-and-sundry on the internet? Everything.
It's similar to the disturbing trend of 'revenge porn', except that this was done by a random stranger with hacking skills instead of an angry ex-lover with a grudge. As with revenge porn (when someone posts explicit or intimate photos of an ex on the internet without the ex's consent), photos like these are almost always taken with permission and freely given within the context of a loving relationship. Everything is fine. There are no sluts here. There is no 'asking for it'. Sharing these intimate aspects of a relationship with the great wide internet after the relationship ends (even if it ended badly) was not consented to, and is therefore as much sexual assault as rape. 'The Newsroom' (an Aaron Sorkin drama on HBO) addresses the revenge porn issue during a particularly poignant episode of its second season.
This travesty is even more cut-and-dried than that. This random stranger never had consent to view the photos in the first place (thus he had to hack phones and iCloud accounts to get at them), and he certainly never had consent to distribute them worldwide. If private financial information had been hacked and distributed, there would be no question as to the criminality of the action. The fact that it's private photos somehow makes the criminality uncertain. I can't even begin to understand that.
Again, it's all about consent, both the viewer and the person being viewed. If the viewer doesn't consent (a man exposing himself to pedestrians on the street), BOOP! onto the sex-offender registry with you. If the person being viewed doesn't consent (peeping toms and stalkers), BOOP! restraining order for you. But because revenge porn and celebrity photo leaks happen on the internet, and because there was consent at some point waaaay back in the process, nobody knows what to do.
Moving on.
Female bodies, sexuality, and expression as public property.
The examples and consequences of this issue are too numerous and widespread to mention them all. Restricting access to both birth control and abortions (at the same time) as an attempt to regulate and control female bodies and sexuality. Cat-calling and street harassment as an indication that a woman and her body are public property and open for comment. The 'third date rule' and similar ideas that entitle men to sex. Annnnnd the idea that hacking and releasing private photos of famous women was in any way ok. These women are famous, therefore I am entitled to see her tits. If the photos were intended to be the public property this maladjusted cretin assumed them to be, he wouldn't have needed hack them. And also, the men falling over themselves to find the photos once they were released. The photos exist, therefore I am entitled to see them.
The moral of this rant is, first, to cut it the hell out with the slut-shaming and the victim-blaming (I think I said that already). Second, in this new digital age where we have an infinite amount of information at our fingertips, most of us have at least some form of online presence and interaction with others, and everyone has a camera in their pocket, we need a new standard of law, morality, and decency. Or we need to follow the current standard along its logical extension into the digital realm. And third, a lot of these problems will fix themselves when we get over the shame and taboos about sex that we inherited as a society from our unfortunate Puritan founders. Taboos and shame wield terrible power in adults, and the only way to really get rid of them is to not teach them to our children. We need to give our children and young adults a proper sexual education that emphasizes safety and responsibility, consent and respect, pleasure and intimacy. Only then will the dregs of society be unable to hide behind the taboos to avoid justice and use the shame as a weapon of mass destruction.
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