"No matter what your opinion of the now notorious online “thesis” of the recent Duke graduate Karen Owen—a comprehensive and often pornographic report on her sexual encounters with 13 athletes, most of them lacrosse players—you have to admit that it was a terrible PowerPoint."
-the introduction of this article - I love The Atlantic :)
This piece made me sad for Karen Owen, sad for me, and sad for the entire female gender. A friend once told me it's impossible for men and women to achieve true gender equality because the physical act of sex necessitates a certain degree of male domination over women (he did say that men and women could be equals in a society without sex, no problem). I did not understand the statement at the time and actually found it to be a bit misogynistic, but now I think I see his point. The advent of birth control may have given women more control over their reproductive status at any given time, but I don't really know if women have achieved (or ever will) true sexual empowerment. No matter how much women want to believe they too can be Sex-and-the-City feminists--independent, confident, and sexually-charged--the reality is that in a sexual situation a woman will never have full control over what happens. I suppose this is just because of the biology of it. It's like a chess game where even though the queen can make any move on the board, it's the king who runs the show. That's just the game.
"What rotten luck that the first true daughter of sex-positive feminism would have an erotic proclivity for serving every kind of male need, no matter how mundane or humiliating, that she would so eagerly turn herself from sex mate to soccer mom, depending on what was wanted from her."
Maybe it's fair because women get childbirth, which to my knowledge men have not been able to partake of. But it's not fair because being a "new feminist" makes it seem like you can play the game like a guy when in actuality you will always be in the more vulnerable position. I'm not proposing that women all quit their jobs and get pregnant and barefoot in the kitchen. I'm just saying that maybe we as women shouldn't expect sex to be what liberates us.
The Hazards of Duke
Karen Owen's PowerPoint
2 comments:
http://jezebel.com/5729592/the-atlantic-weeps-for-the-sad-slutty-drunk-girls
I appreciate your thoughtfulness on this Nan, but Flanagan seems to think that women, in actuality, just want to be someone's girlfriend and could not possibly just enjoy and want to have casual sex. Her article is reductive and a bit condescending.
TV, I'm glad you read this b/c I totally thought of you when they quoted Jezebel :)
I see your point that men shouldn't be the only one's who can enjoy/initiate sexual relations, and I'm not committed to the opinion that most women use casual sex as a substitute for affection and love.
However, I am of the opinion that sex should not be the central focus of feminism. I don't think sleeping around "like a man" empowers women. Being a high-power female lawyer who can hold her ground in male-dominated oil&gas...that's empowerment ;)
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