gender

RCimT: Stuff to be mad about

Jason Thibeault, , , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

As I implied yesterday, there’s far too much going on in this world right now that deserves my ire. I have to mete it out carefully or I won’t have enough to go around, because the meds for my Stretch Armstrong leg are seriously putting a damper on my ability to draw from my bile reservoir. For you though, my faithful readers, I’ll do my best. (I love you both!)

Egypt did a grand thing in ousting Mubarak. The military made many overtures of solidarity with the protesters over the last month, and they installed a “transitional leader” in Vice President Omar Suleiman. Suleiman however has absolutely no intention of transitioning Egypt to a democracy. The military is now singing a totally different tune than during the initial protests — claiming that they will start to move against strikers if they don’t get back to work soon. So Egypt traded one tin-pot dictator for another. Hooray.

Meanwhile, a CBS reporter was violently molested while covering the Egypt protests, and because she happened to be a woman, people are throwing their careers away to snipe at her for daring to try to do something in a dangerous place. Because, you know, being raped and beaten in public and having to be rescued by a group of women and Egyptian soldiers just isn’t enough damage. Lara Logan knew exactly what kind of danger she was in by daring to do her job while in possession of a vagina, thank you very fucking much.

I’m sad to have to report that being right about the “God question” (e.g., being an atheist) does not mean you’re right about other stuff, like gender politics. How a thread can go on so long where so many men think it appropriate to discuss amongst themselves “how to get women into science” while wholly and completely dismissing the women in the conversation, is beyond me. People in positions of privilege discussing how to get the unprivileged into the conversation should, obviously, not dismiss the same unprivileged. DUH. There are a few shining beacons of truth and level-headedness in the Pharyngula thread about the original talk, but they are a cool drink in a vast expansive desert of retardery.

Meanwhile, the Republicans who were swept into power recently with promises of rebuilding the American economy with jobs-a-plenty are enacting several laws on their real priority: shrinking government to only small enough to legislate every vagina in the country. While the House has failed at their attempt to redefine rape, they succeeded in passing an amended version of HR3 to ensure no federal funds are ever spent on abortions. They have also defunded Planned Parenthood, the last line of defense against teenage pregnancy, for daring to refer to abortion doctors the 2% of their visitors that need them — never mind that this means more teenagers will get pregnant and need abortions to begin with. And South Dakota is busy legalizing the murder of abortion doctors. These idiots are decidedly not “pro-life”. They’re “pro-fetus”. Once the fetus grows to the point where they might be born (whether they survive, or not; whether they kill the mother, or not), they obviously couldn’t give a shit about them. I’m sure there’s gotta be a Bible passage somewhere that justifies allowing both mother and baby to die just so a medically indicated procedure doesn’t happen that’s supposedly contrary to some vague interpretation of some arbitrarily chosen translation of some arbitrarily chosen “holy book” out of the thousands that one could choose from.

And there’s always more bullshit when you get religion involved, it seems. Why is it every one of the things I see today that is detrimental to the betterment of humankind as a whole, is inspired by religion? Seriously. It’s getting to be too big a trend to ignore. A new investigation shows that children are still in peril and clergy are still stonewalling investigators even ten years after the scandals in some Roman Catholic dioceses were uncovered and supposedly stopped. If they weren’t in the positions of power they find themselves, children wouldn’t be imperiled by this overriding demand, handed down from the top, to protect Catholicism from its own chief practitioners.

Or how about the religiously inspired Wedge-strategy-approved tactic of sowing disinformation about evolution by legislative fiat? Never mind that there’s no scientific controversy about the theory of evolution — only a controversy in that the theory of evolution apparently runs afoul of some very small-minded provincial interpretations of certain religionists’ ideation of their deity and how special humankind is in the grand scheme of things. No, scientists are well aware that all the evidence available shows evolution is a fact, and that the theory of evolution is merely an attempt at describing the mechanism behind that fact. Any controversy at the moment is in exactly how much influence natural selection, epigenetics, genetic drift, etc., have on the “big picture” of evolution. If this law were aimed at teaching THOSE controversies, I’d be fine with it and others of its ilk, but you’ll invariably find it espoused by people who unironically claim in court that the Earth is six thousand years old.

Canada’s got its own shitty little legal squabbles going on, too. For instance, the Tory-held senate rejection of this bill:

Bill C-389 would amend the Canadian Human Rights Act to protect the rights of transgender or transsexual citizens. It would prohibit discrimination on the basis of “gender identity” or “gender expression” in the workplace or elsewhere, and would amend the Criminal Code so that crimes committed against people because they are transgender or transsexual would be treated as hate crime.

Their grounds? That people might try to go peeping-tom in opposite sex bathrooms and defend themselves by claiming they’re really transgendered.

And the CRTC’s raising people’s suspicions lately about the partisan nature of some of their decisions — like that pesky law they’re suggesting we eliminate that prevents broadcasters from presenting lies as truth in news media.

“It’s totally bizarre. Nobody in the industry has called for it,” Mr. Murdoch said. “Where is the motivation for change that would lower the standards of truth and fairness in broadcast journalism?”

NDP MP Charlie Angus noted that the proposed change precedes the start of Sun TV, a network that has been shepherded in large part by Kory Teneycke, the former director of communication to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

“We all know our Prime Minister well enough to say we don’t have to be in the realm of conspiracy theory here,” Mr. Angus said at a news conference on Monday. “We can draw our conclusions and they are pretty clear.”

It’s no conspiracy. It’s no coincidence. That law is preventing Sun TV from being everything that Fox News is to America: a trojan horse in the news media, intended to pull people’s understanding of reality, and the Overton Window, ever-further to the right. Truth be damned, we need our propaganda, sayeth Harper and his cronies.

That’s it. I’m spent for the moment. I’m sure I’ll find more to rage about soon though.

RCimT: Stuff to be mad about
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Fox vs video games: the Bulletstorm shitstorm

Jason Thibeault, , , , , , , 2 Comments

The other day, when I saw it appear on the Playstation 3’s “What’s New” splash, I downloaded a demo for a first-person shooter game I hadn’t heard anything about before, called Bulletstorm. The demo video preceding the actual playable level pretty much set the expectations for the game — chaotically violent grindhouse with over-the-top game mechanics, protagonists with generally more machismo than intellect (even the girl) who are quick to make lewd sexual references, and buckets and buckets of blood. Despite its outlandish presentation, the demo was actually fairly fun. The ability to kick enemies and have them thereafter hang in mid-air long enough for you to aim at specific body parts is a bit silly. but otherwise my first impression was that with some polish, the game has potential.

I had no idea that potential that I saw was the potential for lulz when Fox News lost their shit over it. But there you have it. Turns out I’m not prescient — whoda thunk it? Though, given their earlier performance in grossly mischaracterizing Mass Effect’s “full digital nudity and controllable explicit sex” (which, as it turns out, is no more controllable or explicit than any sexually tinged and artistically presented offering on Fox Network’s prime time block), I should have seen it coming.

In the new video game Bulletstorm due February 22, players are rewarded for shooting enemies in the private parts (such as the buttocks). There’s an excess of profanity, of course, including frequent use of F-words. And Bulletstorm is particularly gruesome, with body parts that explode all over the screen.

But that’s not the worst part.

The in-game awards system, called Skill Shots, ties the ugly, graphic violence into explicit sex acts: “topless” means cutting a player in half, while a “gang bang” means killing multiple enemies. And with kids as young as 9 playing such games, the experts FoxNews.com spoke with were nearly universally worried that video game violence may be reaching a fever pitch.

“If a younger kid experiences Bulletstorm’s explicit language and violence, the damage could be significant,” Dr. Jerry Weichman, a clinical psychologist at the Hoag Neurosciences Institute in Southern California, told FoxNews.com.

In their private parts! Such as the buttocks! You just can’t make this up.

More commentary below the fold.
Continue reading “Fox vs video games: the Bulletstorm shitstorm” →

Fox vs video games: the Bulletstorm shitstorm

Doing your part for the ladies of the science blogosphere.

Jason Thibeault, , , , 3 Comments

Funny thing happened to me when I was in mom’s womb. I grew a penis. Yeah. I know. Hell of a gift in the grand scheme of things because by virtue of my swinging pipe, it turns out I get a whole lot more say in this world than I’m due. By virtue of some dangly bits I will get better jobs, get more respect, and have a better chance at being heard when I have something to say. I didn’t ask for the hand I was dealt — that’s entirely near-random genetic stuff that I just don’t have the head for.

And yet there are some very excellent science bloggers out there who do have the head for things like genetics and other squishy scientific topics like that — stuff that I can’t fathom, being a mere computer geek and layman. And not just the squishy science, but the math-y science, like particle or astrophysics. By virtue of not having hit the lucky genetic combination, though, they seem to only gain attention when they’re talking about how they’re not getting enough attention. Gender disparity, and gender politics, are the quickest paths to being heard by female science writers it seems. This is a disgrace, because these women know science better than I do — better by far.

The topic came up at Science Online, and reverberated through the blogosphere for the past week, til I decided to chime in. By virtue of my swinging pipe, I will probably be fairly well read on this topic. It is only through acute self-awareness — awareness that I do not deserve this audience on this topic — that I humbly point you to some amazing women writers that don’t get mentioned in the list of favorite science authors any time someone tries to rattle off an informal “top ten” list of their favorites. The fact that Ed Yong, Carl Zimmer, Phil Plait, and other male writers always top those short lists when there are equally good female writers is lamentable, but ultimately fixable through better exposure.

Not the kind of exposure they tend to get, though. Christie Wilcox of Observations of a Nerd recently had a fan approach her on Facebook gushing over… you guessed it… her appearance. The fan said, and I quote: “You are GORGEOUS, and your tits look absolutely incredible.” Nothing about her science writing — you know, the stuff that made him an admirer — and nothing like the kind of civility you’re expected to give a perfect stranger. So, she wrote a blog post declaring war on the blogosphere. Well, sort of. She expressed her unwillingness to be cowed out of the conversation, and her support of anyone facing these same issues.

The trolls that show up in comments for supporting arguments beat the same drum everywhere you see them. Oh my, the trolls. They are a priceless bunch. On David Dobbs’ “STFU” post, the trolls are the main attraction. The ones that claim that a woman must be intentionally making themselves pieces of meat should someone notice that they have breasts. The ones that claim that they are “bear-baiting” by daring to wear makeup at work, then complaining when they get attention for being attractive. The ones that paradoxically claim that women are doing this to get noticed, while at the same time admitting that women that do not dress attractively do not get ahead in their careers. You create the environment where only attractively attired women get any attention, then you try to shame women for daring to complain that the environment is the real issue.

There are a lot of writers who need to be heard on this topic. SciCurious has declared that she’s going to do what she can to self-promote, and to make sure that that self-promotion is about her science writing no matter how others might construe it. This is a tactic that has worked once for Rebecca Skloot, whose incredibly popular and (so far as I’ve managed to read) thoroughly excellent book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks has won her awards and accolades beyond many male science writers, even while she is never mentioned as a science writer in people’s “top tens”. Sci also discusses the use of sex to sell science, and the advantages and disadvantages thereof. Meanwhile, she’s ACTUALLY “busting, busting up the stereotypes”. Unlike the Science Cheerleaders, whose advocacy of science is at best the repeated refrain of “GO SCIENCE!”. No science to be seen there.

Kate Clancy highlights the ‘friend bias’ of cliquishness in the blogosphere, and another where women can say something which is ignored until a man comes along and says the very same thing. These are important trends to note, and to counteract as much as possible — if you see someone ignoring that a woman made the exact same point three comments prior, damn well point it out. If you see that certain commenters latch onto conversation with men, while wholly ignoring pointed and excellent questions from women, damn well point it out.

And Stephanie Zvan identifies the real issue: people simply aren’t engaging with women on their science. Yes, Our Lady of Perpetual Win lives up to her deified moniker, as usual. Not only is it problematic that people are ignoring the work women do in science (much less conversations about science), but it’s also problematic when the only time people regularly retweet, share, or link women into the discussion is when it’s about gender politics. Why is it always about gender politics? Why can’t it be about science?

I’m going to continue my usual effort to promote good science and spread the word regardless of who’s writing it (and the Ed Yong link I posted above is specifically a list of good science that happens to have been written by women). This isn’t a call for “equal opportunity” measures. It is a demand that women not be overlooked for their science work. With my own job taking so much of my time lately, I’ve had difficulty doing as much sharing of science links on Twitter as I might like. I’m going to intentionally devote more time to that practice. I’ve come to follow on Twitter a rather disproportionate number of female science writers in the wake of Science Online 2011, so I expect my promotion of scientific articles will also be rather disproportionately from females. At least, I’m hoping so. Otherwise I’m not really doing my part, am I?

While I have your ear, here’s a blog that has only one post on it yet, though it has all the promise of a newborn. Our Science is a new blog on Nature.com written by a 9th grader named Naseem, an attendee of Scio11, who promises to cover topics like the 2012 doomsday predictions, the recent “aflockalypse”, and why you should consider a career in science. She is catching people’s attention early, and if she’s as good a writer as she seems in the first post, I have every anticipation this will be a breakout skeptical and science-populism blog for the new year. If nothing else, it will be a testament to humanity to watch a 9th grader’s love for science grow as she explores it.

Her gender, mind you, is entirely a circumstance of sorta-random genetics.

Doing your part for the ladies of the science blogosphere.

My compiled live-tweeting of #scio11 sessions

Jason Thibeault, , , , , 4 Comments

So I’ve made it to Minnesota, where the lovely Stephanie and Ben Zvan are hosting Jodi and I for the rest of our vacation, and this is literally my first chance to actually sit down and post anything on this damn blog. My pre-scheduled posts have all gone up, so it’s time to actually sit and put some effort into my blogging again, as time allows of course. Got lots planned for the week, such that chiseling out some time here and there will be difficult at best. I’m going to have to post some short-form synopses of conversations and events that happened during the conference. Completely out of context of course. Because it’s just funnier that way.

For today, here’s what you missed at the various sessions as I saw it. Distilling conversation to 140 chars on the fly is something of a dark art, so if I took anyone out of context, I apologize, and you’re more than free to correct the record. I was the official live-tweeter for the It’s Geek To Me session, so that’s obviously going to have the most thorough live-tweeting. Enjoy!

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My compiled live-tweeting of #scio11 sessions

How does one prove astrology? BY STARTING OVER.

Jason Thibeault, , , , , 23 Comments

The undying zombie astrology thread has attracted another latecomer to the party, this time Curtis Manwaring of Astrology X-Files, an astrology software developer who put together a seemingly testable hypothesis and added it as a comment on that thread. I’m moving my response to its own post, because frankly, nobody seems to be reading any of the follow-ups that have linked to it, and would rather continue the fight there. I’m tired of the single zombie thread, which is responsible for the vast majority of my database difficulties, causing me to hack my website to absurd degrees as a result. If it keeps attracting newcomers, I’ll close it, and add a comment saying “this post is closed, please visit any of the posts linked on page 9 of the comments if you want to continue the discussion.”

The meat of Curtis’ comment appears to be a way to test astrology, or at least one aspect of it. My problem with the suggestion is the same that I’ve had with the concept of astrology as a whole — it depends on a foundation that is simply not there. It builds on hypotheses that have simply never been proven, but rather always taken for granted. For instance, the hypothesis that there is any sort of correlation between the planets’ movements and people’s individual lives. Beyond this, much of what he suggests appears to disagree with other astrologers in the thread — even if you exclude Jamie “Darkstar” Funk of Dark Star Astrology (who has since attempted to shed his association with his ridiculous arguments here by changing his name). And to make matters worse, it appears to misunderstand statistical significance, the importance of sample sizes, and the importance of controlling for variables.

This is, as all my discussions against unfalsifiable and self-perpetuating memes, a long one. Grab a coffee.
Continue reading “How does one prove astrology? BY STARTING OVER.” →

How does one prove astrology? BY STARTING OVER.

Assange and the Fallacy Fanboys

Jason Thibeault, , , ,

The Julian Assange rape case, as I’ve asserted elsewhere, is separate and distinct from the ongoing Wikileaks fallout. However, as with most such celebrities in a sudden and potentially career-ending scandal, the advent of the rape allegations against him have caused any number of conspiracy theorists to emerge from the woodworks — not only to defend Assange as the victim of an international conspiracy perpetrated by the Evil American Empire, but to simultaneously smear the two women who allege he took advantage of them, using any number of rape myths to do so. Among the more galling of these fallacies is the repeated assertion that the allegations against him are “sex by surprise”, which is in actuality a “polite company” euphemism for rape in Sweden.

In taking to the field on various forums discussing the rape allegations, Stephanie Zvan has evidently noted some disturbing trends amongst those conspiracy theorists and other fanboys. She’s begun cataloguing them in the following posts:
Continue reading “Assange and the Fallacy Fanboys” →

Assange and the Fallacy Fanboys

Repeal of DADT sends right-wingers into apoplexy

Jason Thibeault, , , , , , 9 Comments

I am amazed that it took as long as it has to bring a bit of sanity back to America’s policies with regard to sexuality of serving members, but they finally repealed “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”. Yesterday the US Senate voted 63-33 to end cloture, then voted 65-31 (including eight Republicans) to repeal the strange law.

It’s one thing to forbid people from investigating, or discriminating against, gay soldiers. It’s another thing entirely to forbid people from serving while out. There’s a scene in the movie Across the Universe, set during the Vietnam War, wherein someone is expressly NOT refused entry into the army for claiming to be gay. “As long as you don’t have flat feet,” the recruiter says. Reality under DADT, however, expressly forbade any knowledge of a person’s sexual orientation, such that anyone openly gay could not serve, and anyone serving could not come out.

I can kind of understand, in the political climate of the 90s when being gay was only just becoming slightly less taboo — a bit of progress that was slowed with the misinformation around the spread of AIDS. The creation of the law in that climate was obviously intended to allow gays to join, to serve their country alongside straight soldiers — because if someone wants to risk their life fighting for what may or may not be a good cause, it damn well shouldn’t matter what gender or orientation they happen to be.

Except, naturally, to the esteemed and totally sane members of the Party of Family Values.

The new Marine motto: “The Few, the Proud, the Sexually Twisted.” Good luck selling that to strong young males who would otherwise love to defend their country. What virile young man wants to serve in a military like that?

If the president and the Democrats wanted to purposely weaken and eventually destroy the United States of America, they could not have picked a more efficient strategy to make it happen.
— Bryan Fischer, American Family Association

“Today is a tragic day for our armed forces. The American military exists for only one purpose – to fight and win wars. Yet it has now been hijacked and turned into a tool for imposing on the country a radical social agenda. This may advance the cause of reshaping social attitudes regarding human sexuality, but it will only do harm to the military’s ability to fulfill its mission.
—Tony Perkins, Family Research Council

If the lame-duck Congress succeeds in ‘gaying down’ our military this weekend, it will take a disastrous leap toward “mainstreaming” deviant, sinful homosexual conduct – not just in the military but in larger society — thus further propelling America’s moral downward spiral.
—Peter LaBarbera, president of “Americans For Truth About Homosexuality”, a virulently anti-gay organization

Ain’t that just precious. What is it about the right wing that makes them so xenophobic and self-defeating that they’d deign decree who’s allowed to give their lives for their country? They can’t honestly think that being gay makes you less capable of killing people, can they?

Repeal of DADT sends right-wingers into apoplexy

The removal of specific words that could save specific lives

Jason Thibeault, , ,

Our Lady of Perpetual Win (seriously, you should subscribe to her RSS, or better yet, don’t, so her pageview stats inflate somewhat), blogged today about a disgraceful bit of discriminatory politics at the United Nations.

Unless you speak up and tell the world that gays, lesbians and other sexual and gender minorities are due the same protection of their human rights under the law that the rest of us have, this is what you’re supporting.

United Nations — African and Arab nations succeeded by a whisker in deleting three words from a resolution that would have included gays in a denunciation of arbitrary killings. Europeans protested in vain.

…

The reference in the three-page draft came in the sixth of 22 paragraphs and urged investigations of all killings “committed for any discriminatory reason, including sexual orientation.” The provision was among many that had been proposed and analyzed by a “special rapporteur” (investigator) on the subject.

Benin, the chair of the African group of nations, proposed the amendment and Morocco, on behalf of the Islamic Conference, argued that there was no foundation for gays in international human rights instruments as there was in cases of race, gender and religious discrimination.

Because the words “including sexual orientation” were struck from this passage, and despite the “committed for any reason”, countries that kill based on sexual orientation including most of the Muslim states that follow Sharia law will continue to do so with impunity, because the especial force behind those words were stripped away. The denunciation of arbitrary killings is good, because arbitrary discriminatory killings happen every day in every country around the world, but the killing of gays and lesbians is practically institutionalized in some countries like Iran. And it is so, mostly because of their religion.

Religion fucks everything up. And not just certain zealots within the religion — the religion itself fucks everything up. Because it always trumps vague wordings like this. Unless the UN speaks up explicitly about the systematic murder of gays and lesbians in these religiously tainted countries, the religion will always take precedence over the explicit denunciation as inhumane of this religiously motivated practice.

The removal of specific words that could save specific lives

It gets better.

Jason Thibeault, , , 17 Comments

National Coming Out Day was celebrated this past Monday in the States. It was only by a matter of serendipity that I happened to blog about the Mormon asshattery on sale at Wal-Mart, so I can’t claim that was explicitly in honor of the day in all honesty. In point of fact, I’d completely missed it. I don’t feel too bad though — my gay sister didn’t know about it either.

When Jen came out to me as a lesbian, she asked, “what’s the worst possible thing I could tell you about myself?” I answered without hesitation, “That you voted conservative.” For just about anything else — from theism to sexuality to being a member of a pseudoscientific multi-level pyramid scheme — I could live and let live, and have debates on the topic in a reasoned manner. If she’d turned out to be a conservative, I’d have demanded a level of intellectual integrity to account for all the myriad ways the conservative parties directly harm anyone below upper-middle-class, and by extension harm everyone in the entire field of economics as a whole. (Never elect a politician to office whose chief political belief is that government is wrong and must be destroyed. They’ll only do whatever they can to make government wrong and worthy of destruction.) Her sexuality, I could not honestly care any less about.

So when she came out, I thought back (as I am wont to do when I receive new information that colors past events) to all the hints that she might be gay, and I wished I could have been there for her sooner, knowing that other family members have not taken her coming out nearly as well. If there’s one thing I could go back in time somehow and tell her, it’s that it gets better.

Stephanie Zvan didn’t miss the day-of, so I’ll lean on her:

It also makes me quite happy that most of the people I know who fall under the broad heading of GLBTQ (where Q = queer of some sort) are already generally out. A friend of a friend referred to today as “Happy ‘Yeah we know dude’ day.” Today was a day for affirmation for most of them, rather than a day of added risk or longing for what it would be unwise to actually do. One person I’m proud to call a friend used the day to come out as bisexual to her Catholic family.

I’d also like to point out a very touching piece by George W. about the damage done to him as a child in being called “fag”, and how he wears the name like a badge today, despite being a married heterosexual father of four.

When I was in high school I was a notorious fag. Not because I was gay, because I am not. No, I was a fag because I was the president of the drama club, because I hung out with the “wrong people” and because I stood up to the “right people”. I was a fag because I didn’t much care for the politics of high school, I knew who I was and who I was not. I was a fag because I was a little too charismatic to be a “nerd”, a little too normal to be a “freak”, but not popular enough to be spared the humiliation of a bunch of insecure bullies with adult bodies and child brains.

I was subjected to the same kind of teasing. I was a nerd, and called so often, but it was also often rumored that I was gay (the way just about every unpopular kid that can’t get a date ends up having rumors circulated about them). I was punched in the head once for telling a particular name-calling bully to keep his eyes to himself in the locker room, and yet I was the one called gay. That’s how socialization in most grade schools work today. It’s horrid, looking back on it today. And it’s all the more so for people in that age group. Especially if you actually fit the queer description.

When a town council meeting resulted in half the town’s population arguing against a proclamation of October as Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender History Month in Norman, Oklahoma, a 19-year-old boy ended up taking his life over the “toxic comments”. This kind of tragedy could be prevented via less homophobia, less prejudging of people’s character based on a single outlier trait like their sexuality.

What’s worse is, almost every one of the homophobes in attendance argued against the Gay History Month purely out of deference to their religion’s foundational text. Assuming the text is the Bible, most interpretations prohibit suicide (to keep people from offing themselves unnaturally just to get to the “reward” part of their little cult). If this young teen internalized the message not to off himself, he might have lived long enough to realize that once you’re out in the real world, outside of backwater small-town Oklahoma, you won’t be as shunned and won’t be subject to nearly the same amount of toxicity every day.

It gets better. It really does. If you’re a teen, and you’re considering suicide because everyone around you seems to hate you for an aspect of your biology that you can’t change, you should visit the Trevor Project to access resources including live-chat with other teens that have been where you are now. I know it seems like it won’t, and I know it seems like there are too many people in political power right now that despise you because you’re different. But committing suicide is giving in to their desires. Offing yourself just shuffles your life under the rug so you can no longer serve as a counterexample to their hate speech.

Besides, this is the only life you’ve got. Fill it with love. It doesn’t matter what gender you love, ultimately; only that you love.

It gets better.

On the gender inequality of “safe”

Jason Thibeault, 9 Comments

Our Lady of Perpetual Win, patron saint of internet awesomeness, has written a post on a topic I bet is near to the heart of most male geeks, discussing inequality in how relationships are defined before both parties actually get to weigh in on their intentions.

This is the phenomenon in which a (generally young) woman dismisses her behavior around a guy as “Oh, that’s just so-and-so. He’s safe.” It always sounds like it’s meant to be a compliment, but there’s very little like it to bring out the bitter in a guy even decades after the fact. It took explaining the concept of “safe” to the wife of one of these friends for me to really figure out why.
[…]
The men aren’t being asked whether they have any sexual interest and whether they’re okay with it being put on hold. They aren’t being asked where the limits of their comfort with the women’s behavior are. They don’t have an option to say, “No,” except by walking away from the situation. These guys might still choose to engage in flirtatious relationships for the fun, but the choice should be theirs every bit as much as it is the women’s. With the unilateral declaration of “safe”-hood, it isn’t.

It’s another one of those sociological minefields where I suspect the problem stems from blowback from feminists’ reasserting of control (not that I dislike that reasserting, on the contrary), but can sound far too much like whinging. Or sexist. Or merely anti-feminist. Or completely made up. It’s far too easy to dismiss that the inequality even exists, but as someone who’s been declared “safe” before even getting the chance to make any sort of effort at showing romantic or sexual interest, I’m sure it does. I mean, I certainly don’t want to be seen as unsafe. But I want a say in whether I get turned into a virtual eunuch right off the bat, right?

I’m glad Stephanie, yet again, “gets it”. Even if I’m not really sure what “it” is, exactly.

On the gender inequality of “safe”