SlutWalk

We’re going to open up a bag of trouble here, but it’s useful to look into a bag of trouble from time to time.  Some language may offend, so consider yourself duly cautioned.

In January of this year a Toronto cop, Const. Michael Sanguinetti was speaking at a York University safety forum.  Allegedly Sanguinetti commented that “women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.”  Needless to say the manure hit the ventilator. 

After that comment and others from the Bench, Sonya Barnett and Heather Jarvis, two of the organizers of a Toronto protest decided to stick it to the Toronto cops and called their protest a SlutWalk.  On April 3rd, more than 3,000 people gathered at Queen’s Park in Toronto and marched to Toronto Police HQ to protest the comments from the police.  Shortly thereafter several dozen more slutwalks appeared, across Canada, the US and now internationally.  The link above leads to their website and a couple of dozen more satellite SlutWalks that are in the works.

Generally the crowds are regular folks of all segments of the social-sexual-economic spectrum.  Some do dress in what might be called a flamboyant manner but the message is still the same:  No Means No.  That’s a simple, straightforward, easy to understand concept that even very stupid people understand.

The hard part is the term SlutWalk.  

Reclaiming words is a difficult thing to undertake.  Some words are simply too charged with underlying politics to ever be reclaimed or reformed.  Nigger is one term that is so powerful and charged that it has to be treated with a great deal of sensitivity.  We doubt that the N word can ever be fully reclaimed without hurting someone.

Slut, however, might actually be do-able.  The current use is very much a pejorative, heavily loaded with sex role stereotyping, excuse enabling and gender politics.  Men are very rarely called sluts and if they are, it can be perceived as a left-handed ironic compliment on their sexual prowess. 

Call a woman a slut and very, very few will consider it anything but vicious, hostile, degrading, marginalizing and disempowering.

Which is where we get confused, so a parallel is in order.  Here’s the challenge:  Define “pornographic”.

The moment you define porn as “I know it when I see it” you’ve lost.  You are applying a personal, politically and morally loaded, unfair, inaccurate definition to something.  Pornography, at one time defined as literature or visual representations designed to stimulate or titillate, could be as simple as a nude ankle to some groups, or a luscious colour picture of an all-you-can-eat buffet to someone slowly starving to death in the Third World.  What stimulates or titillates one person could be a complete yawn to another.  

The same holds true for a term like “provocative dress”.  Someone in a “I Have A Choice” T-shirt would be very provocative today on Parliament Hill, as a thousand pro-life protestors are on the Hill demonstrating for their particular cause.  Even if the “Choice” T-shirt wearing person meant I have choice between Coke and Pepsi, the term “Choice” has become loaded and not in a good way. 

The same is true with “gay” being rebranded as a sexual orientation short-form term.  However, even some in the male homosexual community consider “gay’” to be inappropriate.  Noted author and Savage Love columnist Dan Savage used to slug his letters with “Hey Faggot!” as an attempt to rip the moral loading out of the word faggot.  Eventually he gave it up in 1999, as people thought his column was called “Hey Faggot!” instead of Savage Love.

Which brings us back to slut and essential problems with language, especially language between the genders.  Our initial position is that language matters, if we want to be positive, inclusive, fair and accurate with the words we use.  That onus is especially on police, who represent all of us, therefore Constable Sanguinetti was out of line when he said: “women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.”.  If he insisted on continuing, something along the lines of “Be aware that how you dress can have others can make unfair assumptions about you.” might have squeaked by, but even that can be misconstrued.  A wiser choice would have been to shut his mouth.

So what’s a slut?  We can’t define a slut without being inaccurate, sexist, pejoratively judgmental and disempowering, so we’ll try to define what a slut isn’t.  A woman with several dozen ongoing sexual partners isn’t a slut:  Horny, yes, we can agree with that.  Enjoying a vigorous sex life, sure.  But even if she likes a dozen at a time, that doesn’t make her a slut.  Possibly facing issues with STD’s, muscle strain, exhaustion and dehydration would be accurate, but not a slut.

Is promiscuity slutty?  Some consider President Jimmy Carter to be a complete slut because he admitted to having sinned many times in his mind with women who weren’t his wife.  As to acting on what was going on in there is a different issue between Jimmy and Roz, not us. 

Is attire slutty?  Is a black bra slutty?  Not if one is wearing a black blouse, a black bra is actually trying not to call attention to ones undergarments, to be demure in a way.  Fishnet hose and garters?  Merely saucy thanks, even if that is the sole attire along with a nice pair of high heels, pearls, perfume and a glistening glow of perspiration.  OK, that was just for me.  I apologize. 

Attire can be inappropriate to an occasion:  Fishnets and a blouse open down to there is not right at a funeral or church services,  It’s a judgment call and sometimes one must adjust ones attire to conform to a situational ethic. 

Attire can also be perilously close to personally embarrassing, assuming one wishes to keep most of the primary sexual characteristics covered.  Which explains why “Tit Tape” is for sale at the neighborhood drugstore.  Some evening fashions for women seem to defy the laws of physics, gravity and common sense.  But it isn’t slutty.

Notice the underlying examples.  Slut almost always applies to women, their attire, their behavior and their actions.  Which means it is a term used to put women down, to disempower them and marginalize their opinions or commentary on events. 

The problem is how men are assumed to perceive women and notice that condition, assumed to perceive.  The social trope is that all men are nothing more than walking erections looking for any available orifice to park themselves for a few moments.  Some religious perspectives insist the tantalizing view of an undraped female ankle will cause all men to immediately fling the woman to the ground in a flurry of frantic fornication. 

In other words, all men are beasts and all women are begging for it, therefore we must control the women as men cannot be expected to exercise even the smallest amount of self restraint.  That is so wrong it makes our eyes hurt just writing it down. 

Believe it or not, not all men are simple beasts.  We might not be the brightest sparks in the fireplace, but we do have a basic understanding that No Means No.  We were taught it and learned it from the men and women in our lives.  That includes parents, peer groups, teachers, friends, lovers and even our media.  We are assuming that Const. Sanguinetti also received those lessons and we’re fairly certain he gets it now. 

There are of course thousands of exceptions to the rule.  The Democratic Republic of the Congo stands as the most heinous example, where according to a study released this week, that 48 women per hour are raped in the DRC.  That means in the five minutes it has taken you to read this far, four women have been forcibly violated in the most hideous way possible.  The reason?  Various militia groups are trying to clear out villages, so they can control the mineral and mining rights.  The rapes have nothing to do with uncontrolled sexual urges and everything to do with politics, power and money.

Which leaves us where with the term slut?  Recognize that the term has nothing to do with sexual behavior or attire and everything to do with politicizing, disempowering and marginalizing people.  If the SlutWalk organizers can reclaim slut then more power to them.  If nothing else, they can educate and reinforce the lessons that words matter.

It all comes back to teaching that No Means No.  The rest is commentary.