![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small}
UPDATE: PLEASE be aware that the poster linked in this post has radically changed his position regarding this issue. In essence, he admits that it may not have been a good idea or at least not an idea that should be widely implemented.
http://theferrett.livejournal.com/10876
It speaks for itself. I'd love to know what community at large thinks about that, because I find reducing women to sets of breasts demeaning.
Edited to say:
-- Not only there is personal boundary issue here, not only there is a devaluation of intimacy and objectification of women, but they don't seem to realize that they have singlehandedly altered the way Penguicon will be perceived. Penguicon - a con where, if you play your cards right, you can score a free feel of someone's boobies.
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
http://theferrett.livejournal.com/10876
It speaks for itself. I'd love to know what community at large thinks about that, because I find reducing women to sets of breasts demeaning.
Edited to say:
-- Not only there is personal boundary issue here, not only there is a devaluation of intimacy and objectification of women, but they don't seem to realize that they have singlehandedly altered the way Penguicon will be perceived. Penguicon - a con where, if you play your cards right, you can score a free feel of someone's boobies.
Comments
DO NOT WANT.
- Jill Myles
Edited To Add: Oh yeah, it's "voluntary." And I bet "Where's YOUR button?" is going to be asked all in good fun and won't feel intrusive or threatening AT ALL.
And I repeat: jerkwad.
-Saundra
Edited at 2008-04-22 07:18 pm (UTC)
Some people should just stay in their mom's basement.
The most terrifying thing is how few people in his comments seem to have any problem with it. What the hell?
(Edited for sense and additional thought)
Edited at 2008-04-22 06:35 pm (UTC)
Fail.
Wow. First, that makes Peguicon drop to the bottom of my list as far as Cons I want to attend.
Second, none of the people involved seem to understand that their little "de-mystifying" project, far from decreasing the objectification of women and boobs, increases it - I don't care if the women involved had "no problem with it". Then they should have kept it behind closed doors. A public display such as this sends the wrong message to anyone who sees it in so many ways!
I find this ironic, coming as it does during April, Sexual Assault Awareness Month. I posted about rape on my journal just yesterday, and now this.
1. Didn't this guy ever hear of "what happens at con stays at con?"
2. Even if it was okay with the women in his small social group, what makes him think it'll be okay with the vast majority of women who attend conventions? And how are they going to keep the jerkwads (who troll cons looking for stupid/drunk take advantage of) out of this "program"? Did anyone take five minutes to think about how this could go terribly, terribly wrong in myriad ways?
3. I appreciate the "if you don't have a button you won't be asked" codicil, but the issues of consent and objectification are SO BROAD here as to make that little CYA statement ludicrous.
4. What happens if some teenage girl puts the button on thinking it's "cool" and then gets into a snit (or God forbid, gets harassed etc. in a very uncool way) and sues someone? A whole convention could go down for this, leaving a lot of fans etc. in the lurch.
5. I am just awed at the massive stupidity of: loosening convention mores, alcohol, and a License to Grope; all put together at once. It's like a perfect storm of sexual harassment and Bad Idea all in one pretty package.
Of course, people have the right to be as stupid as they want to be, especially at conventions, but if I ever see one of those buttons, my knee-jerk reaction is going to drop the assumed IQ points of that person into the gutter. That might be unfair, but in view of the MASSIVE PROBLEMS with this "project" that anyone with half a brain cell and five seconds of thought will trip over, I don't think it's that unfair.
But if anyone touches my breasts, I'm introducing them to my knuckles.
This whole "May I touch your breasts" thing is NOT okay. No matter what the fellow is saying, it **IS** sexual.
Trying to come across as sex-positive and woman-positive in the original post just makes it all the more revolting.
If someone comes up to me and asks to touch my boobs, they're getting the finger at the least and a pissed-off fantasy writer's knee in their balls at worst. There's a REASON that's the normal reaction to a man asking to touch your boobs outside of the bedroom where you're both consenting adults. It's because a man demanding to touch a woman's breasts takes away her dignity and her equal footing in the conversation, and reduces her to the meat of her body, not the words coming out of her mouth. It's degrading and stupid, and I hope that next year someone brings a taser for these idiots.
Or there are always ball-munching weasels.
~Tyhitia
http://obfuscationofreality.blogspot.com/
LOL, Maggie!
Just as a fair warning, someone approaches me at a con and asks the question? Will immediately be slapped silly and probably kicked in the knee with a very pointy shoe. Or else will immediately have con security notified. And if the con does nothing, it's one I won't be going back to.
I don't seem to have the words to say how wrong this all is.
But you've all said them for me.
So, is it time for me to get out the White Stick O' Smiting and go forth smacking these weasels?
Or maybe
The Merriams are not pacifists, fyi.
Heeheehee...
I also replied to the original post, and linked my response there. I'm sure I'll get some responses from that, but God, if it makes even one of these people think about the possible consequences, I couldn't in good conscience NOT link it.
Edited at 2008-04-22 08:43 pm (UTC)
This is, one of the inherent dangers of the internet. Take a moment completely out of context and blow it into a malestrom.
I don't necessarily find it offensive for a man to walk up to me and ask to feel my chest. I wouldn't say yes though, and as I told Jackie if he didn't take my polite no for an answer then we'd have an issue. I've seen stranger things happen at Cons, events, whatever. They tend to exist on a wholly different set of rules from "normal" time.
What does bother me is as some others pointed out is the inherent danger of younger girls (or women without enough self-esteem to tell a man no) getting pawed at by letchers who don't know how to control themselves.
I don't think that the whole thing was meant to "reduce women to a set of breasts" it was just the part he was talking about. Would we all be so offended if this had been Project Elbow instead?*
Reading the post what it appeared to me was again, a spontaneous event born of an interesting discussion that then morphed into something else and thanks to the 'Net was pulled out of context and into the realm of righteous anger.
Because obviously we don't have enough to do other than get mad about some dorkus on the internet.
*as a side note, I'd react the same way no matter what part of my body someone asked about touching, I don't like being touched by strangers - ever. Ask and I'll say no, don't ask and you're liable to get a good sized bruise somewhere tender.