It breaks my heart. It breaks my heart that this never seems to stop happening. And goddammit! It makes me so goddamn motherfucking mad!
I remember being in high school like a million years ago and a classmate had the word "SLUT" written all over her locker. She'd allegedly given a blow job to some boy in the school parking lot. I remember another girl telling me "she deserved it." The boy deserved his high fives.
We send such fucked up and, GOD, complicated messages to girls - we force them to walk this increasingly narrow line between being hot and being respected. I wonder if men understand how complicated this whole "lady in the street/freak in the bed" thing is? I'm 43 years old now and I still haven't figured it how to walk that line. Instead I figured out how not to give two flying fucks about it.
But our girls, you guys! What about our girls? We're sending our girls out into a world where they HAVE to be hot. But not, you know, WHOREY hot. Slutty girls are disgusting, amirite? I ask you: why does Charlie Sheen get to be charming, secondthirdfourthfifth chance rogue while Lindsey Lohan ain't nothin' but a train wreck? You know why, motherfucker? Because we write SLUT on the girl's locker while we high five the boys.
On the other hand, girls, you better make sure the boys want you! I remember a conversation I had a few years ago with a couple of guys about Lady Gaga. These grown ass men were disgusted by how un-pretty Lady Gaga was. Fucking butterface. Where does she get off being famous without being pretty. You HAVE to be hot.
But keep it classy. Otherwise: you're disgusting. Slut.
I'm a little ranty. Forgive me.
You know what? I started this off wanting a feminist "It Gets Better." But as I write this, the less I want it. I don't want gentle assurances that eventually most people grow out of this and stop calling girls sluts. Because they don't! There's still this large segment of American society that insists that girls fit this narrow, uncomfortable FUCKED UP lady in the street/freak in the bed binary. Powerful pundits who are also disgusting middle-aged fat fucking fuckwits call Sandra Fluke a slut and people laugh and applaud! And then they laugh and applaud when the same fucking fuckwit waxes disgusted by how old Hillary Clinton is! How fat Michelle Obama's ass is! There are great big grown up men who think the prime directive of women is to make them come and then make babies. There are duly elected senators who think that rape is something feminists made up!
And, GODDAMMIT! It makes me so mad. It makes me so angry that this fifteen year old girl got hounded by kids (boys and girls) who are, in their own sad stupid way, victims of our fucked up cultural norms where girls get SLUT written on their locker and boys get high fived.
We owe ALL our kids better. We owe our boys the chance to see girls as, you know, people. And we owe our girls the opportunity to be who they want to be and to stop, GODDAMMIT, punishing them so dreadfully when they step outside the respectable/hot binary.
