That's All I Can Stands, I Can't Stands No More

Okay, seeing as I've been gone for about a bajillion years and I've had lots time to think about this, here we go. Today the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal (with whom I don't normally have beef) decided that genital surgery isn't required for a man to be legally recognized as a woman.

Whoooooops, Ithoughtforaminuteyoumadeareallystupidfuckingdescisionthere.

Oh, wait, you did. Now, I'm probably the least qualified person ever to weigh in on the trans debate, but shit. Let me say this right now, and forevermore: penises do NOT belong in the ladies' room. Are we clear on that? I don't care if you, man, like Shania Twain, feel like a woman, you're not. Especially if you're still holding onto the ol' doodle down there. Look, I don't think that all trans women (that's men who wanna be recognized as women, right? Somebody correct me if I'm fucking up) mean direct and inherent harm to real women, but with the seemingly endless fucking demand that they be allowed carte blanche access to any and all womens' spaces, whether or not they've rid themselves of the organ that makes them most obviously male, is scary as all hell in my mind. Men, raised in the patriarchy are taught, either directly or indirectly, that the penis is a weapon. The penis as weapon is used to harm and threaten and control the female population, while at the same time reminding the male of his superiority to those that lack the penis. Do I have to repeat it? I will anyways: penises do NOT belong in the ladies' room.

This decision is all stemming from some dude, who is of course remaining nameless (he is still a dude, after all), who had his testes removed, but not his penis, and thinks that the law and all those under it should now believe that he is woman, hear him roar. So, what's the logic here? If we use the penis-as-weapon analogy again, one could liken the penis to a gun, and argue that without the testes the gun is 'unloaded', and therefore useless as a weapon, as it cannot perform the function it was designed to.

I choose: Strongly Disagree

For the penis-as-weapon is not a gun, nor a knife, nor a club, nor a grenade. To women, the penis-as-weapon is all of these things and more, and whether or not it can perform one or more of it's biological functions is mutually exclusive to the fact that it's very presence can cause great harm to women. A man who does not produce sperm in his semen or who has lowered levels of testosterone due to the removal of the testes is NOT and CANNOT be defined as a man that will not rape, simply because his penis does not perform all of its' normal operations. A man with a penis is still a man with a penis that was raised in a patriarchal rape-culture. Whether he believes he is a woman or not is by and large irrelevant to the fact that he poses a threat to the women whose space he wants access to, due to the way he was brought up to interact with women in the rape-culture.

Anyways, back to the article. A Toronto-based Trans Lobby Group said in a statement it was "thrilled" with the ruling.

“Requiring sexual reassignment surgery is differential treatment based upon a personal characteristic, that is, that trans people are treated differently, and face harassment and discrimination when their legal documents do not match how they present in their everyday lives.” said Susan Gapka, chair of the Trans Lobby Group.

I don't doubt that trans-folk are treated differently. Nor do I doubt that they face harassment, discrimination or even violence. I would not be so crass as to suggest this. I do believe that there may be out there one or more men that truly believe that they are women. That have no negative agenda in their trans-ness. That these individuals would not claim to 'know what it's like to be a woman' as they were not born as females and, in their pursuit of becoming the opposite sex, would gladly rid themselves of their male genitalia. However, from the research I've done about the trans movement, these individuals I just hypothesized about are clearly not the visible majority. Or the visible minority. Or hell, even the invisible minority. There ain't enough of them to make much of an argument, amidst all the dudes demanding to work in rape crisis centres and talk of 'cotton ceilings', topics which many of the other blogs on my sidebar have already covered very completely. I'm seeing the trans-movement drawing too many parallels to the MRA movement these days. Trans-women calling out lesbians that don't want to sleep with folks that have penises. Shit, that's kinda at the crux of what being a lesbian is all about, you know? Speaking as a heterosexual MAAB (and I hope this doesn't come off sounding stupid), I wouldn't wanna sleep with someone that has a penis, either, even if they do believe that they're a woman.

And, is believing enough? To a man who 'becomes' a woman in his teens, or his twenties or his thirties or whenever, is just the mere belief that he's a woman going to undo years of patriarchal brainwashing? Can he ever really understand what it's like to be a woman in today's society, even if he, say, reads all the back issues of Cosmo? Of fucking course not. A man, raised with male privilege and used to solving problems with male privilege (or male violence) will never be able to truly think like a woman. Not a real woman, anyways, maybe just one of those caricatures you see in television sitcoms.

Just like you can't roller skate in a buffalo herd, you can't be a woman if you have a penis. I know it's not actually up to me to make that decision in society, but that's how I feel. I'm not trying to shit on anyone's dreams, but it's biological science, dudes! We're not clownfish. We can't just become one sex or the other over the course of our lives as a natural function. As humans we're born male or female and our genitalia are clear indicators of which. If being 100 % female was really on the agenda, I think you'd want to lose the sausage, not just put on a lady-costume. And under-fucking-stand that to women born as women, the thought of some newly-minted faux lady pissing through a penis in the next stall is frightening. The womens' washroom is one of the only woman-only spaces women have ever gotten without much of a fight from MRA's (see: women-only gyms, etc.) Don't try to take that away from them. I don't know where trans-people are supposed to piss once they're 100% post-op. But, I'll say this one last fucking time: penises do NOT belong in the ladies' room.

"The Worlds' Oldest Profession"

If one does any amount of research and applies the least bit of critical thinking to said research on the subject of prostituted women (and women that appear in various forms of pornography) then one will find that, time and time again, 99.9% of them don't fucking want to be there. Indeed the vast majority of prostituted and offered up women, a majority so huge that it might as well be an absolute, are there against their will, either forced by a person, persons, or the pressures of a society set up to objectify, commercialize and destroy women. So, when I hear the tired old phrase "The World's Oldest Profession" it makes my fucking blood boil. I've stated before I'll only use the term prostituted women here because terms like 'sex-trade worker', even though I'm told they're politically correct, still make it seem like these women choose this life of their own volition, which as I've said, is utter fallacy.

So, if prostitution isn't the world's oldest profession, what is? Well, how about slave trader, or what they're commonly called these days, a pimp? Indeed, since women were barred from officially working for so long (that is, because men decided that waitressing, teaching, nursing and mothering aren't real jobs), how could the worlds' oldest profession be one that is so dominated by women and girls, even to this day? No, prostitution is not a career, not a job, not an industry. But the ownership and exploitation of women and children, THAT'S the worlds' oldest profession right there. The first paragraph of Wikipedia's definition of the history of slavery goes like this:

The history of slavery covers slave systems in historical perspective in which one human being is legally the property of another, can be bought or sold, is not allowed to escape and must work for the owner without any choice involved. As Drescher (2009) argues, "The most crucial and frequently utilized aspect of the condition is a communally recognized right by some individuals to possess, buy, sell, discipline, transport, liberate, or otherwise dispose of the bodies and behavior of other individuals. "An integral element is that children of a slave mother automatically become slaves. It does not include historical forced labor by prisoners, labor camps, or other forms of unfree labor in which laborers are not considered property.

So, that's right. Humans that own other humans. When a human is the property of another. When a human can be bought and sold. When a human can't escape and must perform the work without a choice being offered. That sounds like prostituted women. They're not the workers. Workers have rights. The owners, the pimps are the workers. The women are the product. Bought and used by all the johns of the world. But yet, the onus is still put on them. They carry on the "worlds' oldest profession" even though they have no say in it. It's bullshit. Is the horse called "the worlds' oldest vehicle"? Of course not. A horse is a horse is a horse, of course (unless his name is Mr. Ed). So, why this rhetoric, this catch phrase about prostituted women?

Well, no fucking doy, dude. It's because it benefits men. If the rhetoric goes that women choose this life, and that they have chosen this life since time immemorial, then it becomes so much easier for everyone to just let shit slide. All womens' lives are at risk in one way or another because of prostitution and pornography. But, most people don't give it a second thought. Because they're told it's just "the worlds' oldest profession", that "it's gone on for years, and it'll go on forever", that "women just charge a fee for what men really want" and blah blah fucking bullshit ass blah blah barf.

The next time you hear that old bullshit about the "worlds' oldest profession" tell whatever dumbass fucker who's saying it that the true oldest profession is that of the pimp, or slave trader, and see what they fucking say. Prostitution and pornography is slavery. Just because something's been around forever, doesn't mean it should be allowed to continue, or that if it's ignored it'll go away. The more prostitution and pornography are normalized in society, the less safe spaces women will have. Legalization is not the key. Abolition is. 

Oh Yes, Legalization Would Make This All Better

(That's a sarcastic title, hope it came off that way)

There's a killer on the streets of the nation's capital. Way back in December, Ottawa police chief Vern White did prostituted women a real solid and tipped them off to what they already knew. There is an escalating pattern of violence against prostituted women in Ottawa. The number of not surprisingly unsolved murders of prostituted women in the last few years has risen sharply. Don't believe me? Let me put some humanity on this issue for you, then.

Kelly Morrisseau was found dead in a parking lot near Gatineau Park in 2006.  The body of Jennifer Stewart was discovered at a Vanier parking lot on 120 Alice Street in August, 2010. And most recently, Leeann Lawson was found in September this year in a Lower Town parking lot.

See? Real people, with real names and real faces that had real stories and real lives. Now they're gone. So, it's nice to hear that the police stepped in and asked that prostituted women report their "bad dates" (OPP's words, not mine) and make use of all the resources this great land makes available to them.

Fast forward to today. Nobody's been apprehended for any of the murders. The streets are still increasingly unsafe for prostituted women. The police are still making it seem like there's only one bad dude out there killing these women. As if to say "Oh shit, don't worry ladies, once we get this clown, everything'll be hunky-dory and back to normal!"

But, none of that REALLY helps these women on the streets. They're out there because for all the talk of increased police patrols, the option to report "bad dates" and occasional access to support workers, there are no fucking exit programs. These women are being killed because they're on the streets, both literally and figuratively. The legalization of prostitution would not save these women. Getting them indoors, into legally run brothels, even with panic buttons and the like would not save their lives. I've said it before: No one has ever been beaten or raped or murdered by a street.

These poor, frightened, vulnerable women don't want to be out there. This isn't a fucking lifestyle choice anyone ever wants to make and I'm so fucking sick of that argument. I haven't exactly done a study, but I'll bet the fucking farm that 110% of young girls don't dream about becoming a stripper or a prostitute when they grow up. Childhood sexual abuse, abduction, poverty, addictions, SOCIETY... they make the choice for these women. And men, with their constant demand ensure that choice will always be there. Men and patriarchal society make it so damn easy for women to have no choice but to turn to this lifestyle of abuse (when they're not forcing women into it themselves), just like they make it so fucking hard for anyone to ever leave. It's a trap, and dudes know it, even if they won't admit it.

Making it seem like only one "bad" john is out there is so fucking ridiculous. Quick tip: if you're a john, and that means if you've purchased a woman, ever, on the street, at a massage parlor, in a strip club, via the internet, on DVD, in a magazine, what the fuck ever; you are a bad fucking person. You are capable of despicable, heinous violence because you've already taught yourself how to turn a human being into a meaningless commodity. Johns are killers. The act of purchasing a woman hurts her, harms her, kills her, over and over again in a way that no man can fully understand. Anyone who engages in the degrading and purchasing of human lives is a dangerous individual.

Getting one rough dude off the streets won't save prostituted women. Legalizing prostitution won't save prostituted women. Criminalizing the johns would certainly help, but it's only the first step. The demand has to cease. Or something else has got to change, drastically. While I don't think female separatism is a bad idea, I don't think dudes would be very down with it, and would probably try their damnedest to wreck any happy lady-only communes that sprung up. But, something's got to give. Women are in constant danger, and none more so than prostituted women. People need to start thinking about how to save the lives of these many human beings, not about getting their goddamn rocks off.

Am I Still Here? Yes.

Sorry for the absence, folks. The computer went down and it took the tech might of my awesomely talented partner to get it up and running again. I cheered her on. It was super cool.

Anyways, this blog should be back up and running at its' normal level of inefficiency by next week proper.

To tide you all over, remember it's absolutely okay to crack Steven Tyler upside the dome should you pass him on the street. Why?

I'm a weird lookin' plastic rapist!

Do you really need for me to give you any more reasons than that?

Who I Hate #4

Haven't done one of these in a while, and this one might actually be the most relevant of the series thus far (excluding, of course, my numerous rants on why I hate Steven Tyler).

Who do I hate?

Hugo Schwyzer

Image found at https://www.facebook.com/SayNoToHugo

So, if you don't know who this fucking shithead is, I'll give you a quick rundown. Hugo here is an instructor of gender studies and history at Pasadena City College. He blogs a lot too, at his own shitty blog, at the "Good Men Project", at the ever-disappointing (and misogynist!) Huffington Post and, for whatever reason this was allowed, at Jezebel. He co-organized the Los Angeles Slutwalk and wrote some shitty books that I won't bother to mention. When he's not busy with all of that, you'll probably find Hugo pretending to be the epitome of a male feminist, raping his female students, writing columns about how anal rape and facials are great for women and men(but mostly men) or trying to kill his ex-girlfriend in a drug-fueled rage.

Hugo's a snake. That's about the mildest way it can be put. He poses as an ally to women, but in reality he is a huge misogynist, has no respect for women or womens' spaces and derives great pleasure from the perpetuation and normalization of humiliating, degrading and harmful male-centric sexual practices against women. Anyone with an ounce of awareness can see right through his bullshit, but the problem is that the real feminist viewpoint gets shushed by the media and leaves only dickheads like Hugo to speak to the masses. Hugo is the perfect reason that women should be extra wary of men. He is the reason that womens' separatism makes sense. He IS the reason that men should not be able to infiltrate womens' spaces.

I don't even know what more to say about this pile of shit. He's the fucking worst. I wish only the worst things in the world upon him. I worry that this post might sound a bit hypocritical to some, me being a male myself, calling myself a feminist and shitting all over this dude. None of you readers (if there are any of you out there) know me at all. You'd be forgiven for wondering what the difference between myself and Schwyzer is. But I hate him so fucking much. How dare he lecture women on feminist ethics and patriarchal culture?!?! He exploited young women for sex. His students. He held a position of power over them and used it to rape them. Does no one see that as just a tad wrong? Doesn't that at least call for the repossession of his "#1 Male Feminist" coffee mug? Fuck! How does this fucker still have a job, a teaching job,  a teaching job where he teaches about womens' issues like he has a fucking goddamn CLUE about them!!! All the while writing pro-pornography articles like they're going out of style. He just makes me so damn sick and sad.

Hugo Schwyzer, I hate you so very, very fucking much.

(Minor) Inquiry Update 3

RCMP could have done more in Pickton probe

Yeah. No shit.

However, it's not like the VPD did any better on their side of the investigation. At least the fact that both the RCMP and VPD were wasting their time squabbling with each other, rather than arresting a serial rapist and murderer has come to light. Although, no one really seems to be paying attention to that. So, I'm just going to save everyone a lot of trouble and lay out what happened right here:

Both police forces knew Pickton was guilty. Both police forces couldn't give two shits about the victims. Both police forces had separate but equal information that could've led to a timelier arrest of Robert Pickton. However, I believe each police force wanted the other force to do all the work, without the sharing of each of their respective information and each force wanted credit for the collar, even if they weren't the ones who actually caught the bad guy. So, the endless fighting between municipal and federal police let Pickton rape and murder forty-nine women before he was caught. And the police still don't care about the victims. They just want to come out of this looking as good as they possibly can. And they most likely will. The longer this inquiry goes on for, the less media attention it will receive and eventually the populace at large will forget about this case altogether, until the conclusion of the inquiry, whereupon one or two people will get a slap on the wrist and the VPD and RCMP can go back to ignoring crime against women as usual.

Fuck all of you officers who were too busy worrying about your egos and reputations, and not giving the slightest shit about the growing number of dead and missing prostituted women in your midst.

This Can Only End Well

A while back I wrote about one Brad Trost, a Conservative MP who thought that the Conservatives weren't being Conservative enough when it came to the issue of abortion. As you may recall, Trost was one of the leading characters in the defunding of Planned Parenthood's Canadian arm. Which is what I thought about when I read this.

It's happening here, too. All of those things that everyone wants to believe are only happening in the backwards, hick-ass, bible-belt southern United States are starting to happen up here in Canada. Abortion clinics are being closed all over the place. Wait times are unbelievable. Sometimes, a woman might have to travel to another city to have an abortion. And now, Conservative MP Stephen Woodworth would like to redefine when a fetus is considered to be a full-fledged human being, complete with rights that supersede the rights of the woman carrying said fetus. And, in a textbook case of 'no fucking shit they did', the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada was all 'Fuckin'-A right on, Stephan!'. So, yet another Conservative MP challenging Harpers' as-of-yet unbroken promise to not reopen the abortion debate. Only this gets worse, because as we've seen down in the States, when fetuses get rights, abortion becomes murder, not only in the eyes of evangelical types, but in the eyes of the law, as well. Women who abort their pregnancies, or even miscarry can be charged with a crime, fined or jailed. Don't think for a minute it won't happen here, too.

As stated, Woodworth has beef with the current definition of when a fetus becomes human, and is leading the charge to have the law redefined. He says the current law defining a human being dates back to centuries-old English common law and Parliament has a responsibility to lead a debate on whether it's time to rewrite it. Quote Woodworth:

"Our definition of human being says that a child does not become a human being until the moment of complete birth,"

Ever notice how these dudes seem to hate centuries-old laws when they give women and children any sort of autonomy (which is rare enough), but they got no problem following the centuries-old laws in their magic-bible-storytimebooks? Ah religious types, you infuriate me to no fucking end. Seriously, a caterpillar ain't a butterfly until it busts outta that fucking cocoon, and a baby isn't a baby until it's born. It can't order a pizza in the womb, it can't vote and it can't actually exercise any other rights these evangelical dipshits want to give it. And nobody's being fooled. Joyce Arthur, spokeswoman for the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada knows exactly what's up. Quoth her:

"When the anti-abortion movement says they want to reopen the debate, it means they want to recriminalize abortion. That's really what it's about," 

"When you're talking about giving rights to fetuses, essentially, which is what they're talking about here, obviously that is going to impact abortion rights."

So, yeah, that's pretty much what I was thinking, too. Shit is getting bad, folks. I saw this coming. There's a butt-ton of Conservative MP's out there who want abortion to be a criminal offense again. And I believe that even if Harper doesn't reopen the debate, he thinks that if should be a criminal offense as well. These backbenchers will just keep coming out of the woodwork, probably on the Prime Ministers' orders and whipping the evangelicals into more of a frenzy than they're usually in. Evangelicals and pro-lifers are loud. And that's a problem. Because if they stay loud for long enough, well Harper might just decide that (much to his fake chagrin) he has to reopen the debate, if only to calm the masses. We have to get the Conservatives out of power in the next election. Speak for womens' rights with your votes. Support womens' safety with your votes. I know the next election is a long way off, but get organized now. Talk to people, get them on board. If you're not a voter, or not registered, do it. Religious people, racists and sexists are already mad good at voting. That's why so much of this shit happens. So, if anyone like-minded is reading this, and you're NOT at the very least voting against the bad guys, then please, I implore you to get active to at least this level. You'll be happy you did. And you've got time to do it. Now is the time, before things can get any worse.