Today Did Not Start Well

I woke up with a headache, couldn't find my dissection kit, ran out of cereal, knocked my shins off things - the whole lot. My concerns, however, are minor compared to the news today of the ways in which the recession is hitting women.

First, a report on GMTV told how a fifth of women and a quarter of men (surprise, surprise) felt that, if a business has to make some employees redundant, the the maternity-leavers and possibly the working mothers should be given the boot first. Can't be having women with children working to support their progeny, can we? Why, they may have concerns outside of making their employer rich! They're a drain on the economy - in fact, I bet they're the reason for the whole recession. Women! Go back home and let the mostly male people in suits get us out of the fix they created. The men will save the day if you just stop stealing their jobs! etc.

With the sour taste from that little newsbit still in my mouth, I returned from classes to find this Guardian article sitting in my inbox. It's predicted that violence against women will go up as people (men) get more stressed about finances.

The attorney general, Lady Scotland, has also warned that domestic violence will rise with increased financial worries. The government booklet devotes a section to the impact of the recession on divorce, violence and family tensions.

"Economic downturns can be difficult times for family relationships. Worries about finances can create additional tension and in some cases, where couples have already decided to part, problems over selling the family home can deepen tensions," the booklet states.

It goes on to say: "Women may face threats from violent or abusive partners." Information about the state-funded services on offer for victims are set out in the leaflet, with advice about when to call for help from the police. A separate report headed "Are women bearing the brunt of the recession?" published today by the Fawcett Society echoed the government's concern, warning that "women's social and economic circumstances make them particularly vulnerable to economic downturn". The campaign group for women's rights said there had been an increase in domestic violence referrals.

Fix the economy, please. And whilst we're at it, teach those guys some better ways to manage their anger. You know, something OTHER than lashing out.

Sod today for a bundle of laughs, I'm going back to bed.

There are tennis fans...

... and then there are fans of women who play tennis. Or rather, their bottoms.
Yep, it's summertime here in Great Britain and the charming, world-class tournament that is Wimbledon has begun. The men's games have been reported upon fairly normally, with all the disappointment and excitement directed at various players' performances. The women's games have also been receiving the same depressing commentary as always - aside from a bit of cursory critique of each player's ability on court, the majority of the mainstream coverage of the sport has, yet again, been about the ladies' bodies and clothing choice.

This year though, instead of just posting a million upskirt shots, the tabloids (and, unfortunately, some of the more upscale papers) have had something to complain about. Guess what? One of the lovely lassies isn't conforming to their fantasies. Maria Sharapova, one of the world's best tennis players who won the Wimbledon women's tournament against the favourite and defending champion Serena Williams at just 17 years of age in 2004, has decided that she'd like to play wearing shorts this year. Nothing too tight or too baggy, neither too long nor too short; just a pair of white fitted women's shorts, allowing her comfort and freedom of movement without having to worry about what kind of underwear she has on as they will always be hidden from the crowd. Why not? I'd do the same - personally, if I were in her position, playing tennis in front of millions of viewers and knowing that there are tonnes of seedy reporters who will jump at the idea of plastering my arse all over their front pages without my permission, perhaps wearing shorts might encourage them to consider my gameplay instead. Y'know, like they do with the men's tournament. And hey, her legs are still visible, her outfit is shaped and fitted, so if they really must comment upon her body it's still there to see. In fact, you'll notice from the picture that she's showing more or less the same amount of skin in her shorts as in her dress. Millions of women participate in sports dressed in similar attire every day - it is practical and comfortable, doesn't flap around and generally does the job of covering you up without negatively affecting your gameplay. Which is what all basic sportswear should do.

Ladies and gentlemen, at this point I must confess that I am utterly, completely bored. I want to get angry about something, or maybe be pleasantly surprised. With this in mind, let's see what that beacon of bad taste, The Sun, has to say on the subject.

DISMAYED tennis fans yesterday condemned Maria Sharapova’s new Wimbledon shorts as pants.

They reckoned the leggy Russian babe will look far too manly — and asked: Where are the tiny skirts we love so much?

...

Roofer Steve Johnson, 35, of Earlsfield, South London, said: “I come here for the tennis but there’s no denying it’s a bonus to watch some of the women players running around in short skirts.

“Sharapova’s a great player but I feel she’s letting down blokes in the crowd by opting to wear shorts.”

Marketing executive Gary Olsen, 40, of Bristol, said: “Sharapova’s a great looking girl and a great talent.

“But I don’t understand why she feels the need to recreate the look of Martina Navratilova.”

It's okay, folks - I've taken my tranquillizers today and have none of that dreaded PMT that will no doubt turn me into a raging monster incapable of rational thought*, so your country is safe! Also, here's a personal confession - I think a lot of the tennis players today are hot. The men and women on court, and in many other sports (rowing, anyone?) are physically stunning as a result of their training. However, there's a difference between "casually noting that the athletes are good-looking" and "reducing 50% of the players to their collective body parts and sex-appeal and normalising this in the media", which is what I'm taking issue with today.
Firstly, using Martina Navratilova as an insult is probably one of the worst things here, because it shows how common the judgement of women by their appearance is. Yes, Navratilova did wear shorts on court. She's also the former World #1 Women's Tennis player, and has been described as "The greatest singles, doubles and mixed doubles player who's ever lived", but that's irrelevant because she didn't pander to the heterosexual male gaze, which is the whole point of women's tennis don't'cha know.
'Letting down the blokes'?! Here's the thing, Mr. Johnson - Sharapova does not spend all her time playing in tournaments and training to stay in peak physical form just so the lads can have a nice bit of totty to ogle once a year. This is her CAREER. She enjoys tennis and is so fucking good at it that she can play in the biggest event of the year and have a good chance of winning. She is an athlete, not a Hooters waitress, and her future in the world of tennis rests upon her being able to play the sport better than the vast majority of people, not upon whether you can see her bum and give it marks out of ten.
Moving on to Mr. Olsen. I can't help feeling he only chucked the word 'talent' in there as a nod to decency, to stop people saying he's just a dirty old man. As we've already established that, standing still, Sharapova's outfit reveals no less than her previous ones, we can gather that he, and the other men in these articles, are angry because they can't look up a young woman's skirt. Allow me to spell out in simple terms, Gary, the possible reasons for her decision to wear shorts.

• She wants to.
• She is fed up of having people like you, strangers she's never met, passing comment upon her like catcallers in the street.
• There are no rules against wearing shorts.

What's all this about her being manly? So WHAT if her attire is a tiny bit less feminine than before? So WHAT if her knickers aren't on display? She's a woman making a choice about what she wants to wear. Her clothes do nothing to conceal the fact that she is female, in fact, if you are calling her outfit masculine then I suggest that you imagine Roger Federer wearing the same ensemble.
Quite.
Whilst it's not as 'ladylike' as the tennis skirt, it's still a far cry from what's considered 'menswear'. But even if it were utterly manly, why does it matter so much?

Why?

Because women's tennis, never forget, has little to do with tennis. The sport is just to get the ladies moving and bouncing for the men. Then, when the tournament has ended, you can see all those women you have been feverishly fantasising about naked in Playboy magazine. These women, these world-class athletes, these sporting role-models, just aren't doing their job if they don't dress up all feminine and sexy for the men. If they aren't getting their bums out for the lads, what right do they have to be on court? What's the point of women entering Wimbledon if they're just... going to play tennis?



*It's true! That's what menstruation does! I read it on the internet somewhere!

Lord wants virgin nurses or no nurses

Well, not quite, but Lord Mancroft is clearly shocked that the nurses looking after him have sex.

Lord Mancroft told the House of Lords that he was treated at the hospital in 2007, and described the nurses as "grubby and drunken".

"The nurses that looked after me were mostly grubby. We're talking about dirty fingernails, slipshod, lazy."

The hospital said it had received no complaint but would be contacting Lord Mancroft to discuss the matter.

Yes, nurses should be held to high standards, should take care of their appearance and personal hygiene as a fundamental requirement of working with hospital patients. And DRUNKEN, you say? They were drinking on the job? They should be sacked!
Oh, no. Nothing so serious. Here's what he ACTUALLY means.

"It's a miracle I'm still alive. But worst of all my Lords they were drunken and promiscuous."

"How do I know that? Because if you're a patient and you're lying in a bed, and you're being nursed from either side, they talk across you as if you're not there.

"So I know exactly what they got up to the night before, and how much they drank, and I know exactly what they were planning to do the next night, and I can tell you, it's pretty horrifying."

Emphasis mine.
Nurses shouldn't act like the patient isn't there and shouldn't gab about their personal lives whilst caring for patients, but come ON! WORST OF ALL? Not the lack of hygiene, the careless attitudes, the laziness - no, these nurses DRINK! and have SEX!!! like MEN do sometimes!!!!!!!!! Pass the bleeding smelling salts, I'm not prepared to be cared for by human beings with lives outside their work. If I'm not going to be nursed by teetotal virgin angels that have no vaginas, or at the very least women who pretend to be just like this, I'd rather not be cared for at all.

That's what Mancroft's insinuating, perhaps with less melodrama. By his own wording, he's treating the fact that these nurses go out, drink, and have sex in their free time with as much horror as if they had been drunkenly humping the patients themselves. The real complaints to be found here are

• that the nurses weren't maintaining an acceptable level of hygiene and therefore could be putting patient health at risk
  
• were discourteous towards their charges
  
• were scruffy and unprofessional, and
  
• that drinking heavily the night before going into work could impair their ability to deliver a high standard of care (whilst discussing this in front of a patient will do nothing for their trust in their carers).

THOSE are complaints. 'My nurses like alcohol and have libidos' is not.

Dear Lord Mancroft,

Grow up, lodge real complaints and stop slut-shaming.

Yours,
Mwezzi.

No "kisskisskiss for you". That might be too slutty for your tastes.



NOTE: Click the title of this post for the BBC article. Neat, huh? Please tell me if you prefer this format or not.

Doctors are supposed to help, right?

Back at the start of November I got ill. Very ill. Can't-get-out-of-bed, can't-eat-due-to-severe-pain ill. It turned out that I'd come down with a nasty case of tonsillitis, so I saw a doctor for the first time since I broke my arm 10 years ago. She was sympathetic and patient, she listened to my concerns and symptoms, gave me a quick once-over and prescribed me a ten day course of penicillin. This particular GP has a long waiting list of patients who prefer to see her, and she must've been busy, yet I couldn't have hoped for better treatment at such short notice.

Fast forward to today. Since my tonsillitis was treated I've had a persistent cough, at one point coughing up thick discoloured mucus for a period of at least 2 weeks. I've had aches and pains, suffered lethargy and disrupted, irregular sleeping patterns, and have been much paler than usual. I'd been working in a pharmacy over Christmas helping people with common winter cold and flu related problems, which may not have been great for my weakened immune system but gave me a fairly good grounding in the basics of what is and isn't normal, and from my personal knowledge of my own health I knew this wasn't a normal cold - they used to be the only health problem I'd have, getting them once a year, and I'd have shaken it off in, at most, a fortnight. This was my first long-term illness; yet still I was prepared to leave it for as long as possible in the hope I'd fight it off unassisted. However, today I finally gave in a saw a GP. Not the same one as last time. He was also a busy man, of course, and I understand that he has many patients to see - but this didn't warrant his interrupting me as I listed my symptoms to 'remind' me that he had house visits to do, as if I'd just popped in for a chat without making an appointment. I was instantly made to feel like a nuisance. My sleeping problems were brushed off with standard advice that I'd seen before - 'try reading, don't use the computer near bedtime, cut down on caffeine,drink something warm and milky, gentle midday exercise, warm baths' - which I'd tried before, but felt so belittled that I didn't say. I wish I had. He looked a little put out when I explained that no, I wasn't a student, nor was I undergoing any stressful points (or at least, not for the full 3 months!). I guess I he realised I wasn't so easily brushed off. My cough was diagnosed, after some chest-hearing, as a viral cough - these are fairly common after an infection like I've had, and can take a while to go away, and I was advised to come back in another month if it hadn't subsided. This is fine, I understand this, but the way it was delivered just made it sound more like he was dismissing me as a hypochondriac than as someone who has a very slim medical file and no history of such complaints who has a very good reason to be worried. On the plus side, my paleness and lethargy was plain to see and he ordered some blood tests done - I suspect anaemia (like my mother has) or some other deficiency, I'll find out when my results come in next week.

This reminded me of another case I heard. A friend of my mother once came in in a fury and said, "If your daughter becomes a doctor, make sure she doesn't become a pompous git!" Her own daughter is away at university and had been suffering from a variety of stress-related and other health problems, and eventually went to see a GP. He basically looked down his nose at her and dismissed her concerns as 'women's problems' and that he 'suspected you girls get these complaints all the time'. Seriously! She has problems which she hasn't had before, goes to see a doctor as any concerned person would, and is told she's overreacting and a silly little girl!

Why are so many doctors - and I hate to say it, but the majority of such complaints I hear seem to be about male GPs towards female patients - such condescending arseholes? They are trained and paid to help all their patients without making them feel like they're stupid or making stuff up. No WONDER the first GP has such a long waiting list, when some of the others at the practise are so unsympathetic. 'Women's problems'? How about, instead of packaging up all sorts of complaints into these two words (which seem to have become short-hand for 'unimportant time-wasting matters'), the doctors explain to the patients the possible causes for their complaints and, if it IS possibly related to hormonal changes in a woman's body, help her to understand what's happening and give ways to help cope instead of dismissing her? We don't get a lot of readily-available information about our bodies aside from 'you'll grow breasts and have periods during puberty. This may hurt a little. Try not to get pregnant or infected if you must have sex. Eventually you'll be unable to have children, so remember to have plenty when you're young or you'll regret not contributing to our already oversized population and following the urges you must have if you're a real woman.' A lot of the changes caused by hormones and the possible discomfort this can cause is ignored, so when women DO experience them it can be worrying or even frightening, so WHY DON'T DOCTORS UNDERSTAND THIS? More to the point, why do we have to go so much out of our way to find out about such things?

Ugh.


[UPDATE: All this 'medical rape' stuff recently just got me even more riled. Men and women across the medical establishment are ignoring their own patients. All these stories are coming from women - that is the one common factor in these tales so far, it is WOMEN who are feeling that they have been truly violated, although there are men who are also having their concerns and voices ignored. Where is all this arrogance coming from? Why are doctors, nurses and midwives ignoring the need for their patients to consent to any and all procedures, failing to see how traumatic it can be to have ANYONE force ANYTHING upon someone who's already in a vulnerable state? Are doctors also carrying out prostate exams on men whilst they're repeatedly told to stop, or are they only forcing things into women 'for their own good'? WHAT'S GOING ON?]

'Yale sluts' fight back

The Women's Centre at Yale University are suing a fraternity for sexual harassment after they posted a picture on Facebook of several of their members standing outside the Centre holding a sign reading 'We love Yale sluts'. Because I'm in a hurry, I'll just let my outrage at such a stunt be implicit (and Feministing says it well enough), but I did enjoy a rather stinging comeback in the comments to yet another 'bloody overreacting feminists' idiot:

D '10 says:

I hate it when law-illiterate morons threaten to take legal action against people for non-crimes. Get your act together Yale Women's Center.

January 21, 2008 7:18 PM

Y '11 says:

I hate it when ignorant morons hold up a sign that is derogatory to women in front of the parent organization of the support group for rape victims on campus. The Yale Women's Center should clearly respond to this photograph. There is a case to be made for sexual harassment here, and sexual harassment is a crime. Get your act together, Zeta Psi.

January 21, 2008 7:37 PM

You tell 'em. Calling women 'sluts' at a place that helps women that are often accused of 'asking for it' and 'being provocative' is beyond the fucking pale. Why must people constantly try to undermine (any organisation set up for) women? Why is such sexism considered funny? Holding up a 'we love the KKK' sign in front of a vandalised Asian community centre would be rightly seen as racism - why don't we treat sexism in the same way, why do we dismiss it as mere tasteless humour?

New Blog Links!

I've added a couple more feminist sites to the right there, and you'll also notice a new section - "Of Interest". This is for not-necessarily-feminist sites that are well worth a look at - and the first one, Ramblings of Today's Yoof, is written by a friend so I will be very sad if you don't visit it. It currently focusses on consumer advice for people interested in all things green and earth-friendly, as well as products that could be better for you. She's covered budget- and environmentally-friendly household cleaning products (and knows which ones do and don't work!) and even fairtrade contraceptives, so go have a look. She also writes about human rights, and this includes feminism - she's just put up a video of standard anti-feminist bullshit, which we've both flagged.

Slut-blaming, again.

From BBC coverage the of the Ipswich murder trial:

Despite the case being about determining whether Steve Wright killed these women, they had to slip in this comment:

Peter Wright QC, prosecuting, said the decision by the women to turn to prostitution "was ultimately to prove fatal".

Yep. Deciding to sell their bodies ended their lives, not the decision of one disgusting person to hunt them down and kill them. *sighs*

Well, I guess I was asking to be robbed and my house burned to the ground with my family inside...

... I mean, I left a window open. I was asking for it.

Does that argument stand up, to you? Would you let someone off the hook for something like that on those grounds?

I wouldn't, and I'm usually a pretty forgiving person. Unfortunately, we are seeing similar kinds of arguments every month, only on the subject of rape.

'Oh, she was drunk/walking home alone/wearing a short skirt, guv. She was asking for it.'

What's more, despite the law being changed to be just a tiny bit more helpful to rape victims in court, excuses like this are still being accepted every day, all over Britain, by otherwise competent juries and judges. Somehow, women are being made responsible for being attacked. They did something 'unladylike', which provoked a man. And as we all know, men are useless at controlling themselves and can't be held responsible for their actions at all. (Yes, boys, that's what you're being made to look like while the women are called whores. You are subhuman and severely lacking in any self-restraint or moral character.) So the blame falls on the shoulders of the victim, who is defamed AND punished for defaming the poor little rapist.
Oh, aside from her actions at the time of the event being twisted like this, our victim may also be judged by her sexual history. Despite laws against this now, it is still happening. Some of you may have heard the infamous comments made by an anti-choice politician in America saying that rape only happens to young white devoutly Christian virgins who have been horribly ravaged and sodomised - the implication being that anything else just ain't rape. Here, if you aren't a virgin, your chances of winning your case decrease with every sexual encounter you have had in the past if the courtroom hears about it. Similarly, if you show no obvious physical signs of being viciously attacked, they'll assume you didn't put up much of a fight and thus it was all consensual.

So, lets just labour the point here.

Rape is NEVER the woman's fault.
No-one 'asks' to be raped.
Regardless of what she was doing or wearing, what happened to her was STILL rape. Drunk? Rape. 'Provocatively' dressed? Raped. Alone at night? Rape. Being female? Rape. Being male? Rape. Being an 'easy target' in any way? Rape. It doesn't matter how the victim responded to the attack, if it was non consensual, it was rape, and remains as illegal as if they were swaddled head to toe in thick winter clothes and had tried to beat the crap out of their attacker in their efforts to escape.


Why is has she chosen this subject today, you may well ask. The BBC reports the apology from a Muslim cleric about his sermon which compared non-hijab-wearing women to 'uncovered meat'.

"If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside... and the cats come and eat it... whose fault is it, the cats' or the uncovered meat?" he asked.

The uncovered meat is the problem, he went on to say.

"If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijab, no problem would have occurred," he added.

Sheikh Hilali also condemned women who swayed suggestively and wore make-up, implying they attracted sexual assault.

He has apologised after an outcry by Muslim women in Australia, saying '...the sermon was targeted against men and women who engaged in extra-marital sex and did so through alluring types of clothes...'.
Try fitting that in. It doesn't quite fit with the wording, does it? Oh, for the record, women who wear the hijab and/or stay at home get raped too. In fact, the majority of sexual assaults and rapes are carried out by people, such as friends and family members, who knew the victim well - not by the stereotypical shadowy monster in a dark alleyway (though, of course, this happens too). In these cases, they cannot be safe in their rooms, and no amount of modest apparel will change that. Changing attitudes towards women will.